Sid Miller explores seven routes from the coast to the mountains, from inner-city Portland to the Idaho border. Dot-to-Dot, Oregon, a collection of fifty poems, travels through the cities, towns, and monuments of Oregon. Using these locales as a background, three voices narrate the author’s loving but critical relationship with the state he calls home.
Zagreb, Exit South is a deep, melancholy book about the resignation of the 40 year old, about people who have given up on life, who can only exist on the street or in bars because they fear and dread going home to their high-rise caverns in New Zagreb where the rules of an allegedly organized world reign. But Popovic’s characters have no patience with the lies of this world. They have no patience because they have neither homes nor a homeland: they have lost all their illusions.
What does poetry mean to today’s teenagers? We Belong In History: Writing with William Stafford brings together middle and high school students from around Oregon to answer this question. This unique anthology mixes beloved Poet Laureate William Stafford’s poems with verses by young writers inspired by his work, his passions, and his legacy. Both an anthology for readers and a toolkit for teachers, this book also includes lesson plans to help instructors nurture a passion for poetry, for William Stafford, and for writing in the next generation.
The women’s suffrage movement is in full swing in 1912 Portland, Oregon—the last holdout state on the West Coast. Miriam desperately wants to work at her father’s printing shop, but when he refuses she decides to dedicate herself to the suffrage movement, demanding rights for women and a different life for herself. Amidst the uncertainty of her future, Miriam’s attention is diverted by the mysterious Serakh, whose sudden, unexplained appearances and insistent questions lead Miriam to her great-grandmother’s Jewish prayer shawl—and to her destiny. With this shawl, Miriam is taken back in time to inspire the Daughters of Zelophehad, the first women in Biblical history to own land. Miriam brings the strength and courage of these women with her forward in time, emboldening her own struggles and illuminating what it means to be an independent woman.
Up Nights, Daniel Kine’s second book, is a classic road novel for a new generation. In raw, unrelenting prose, Kine tells the story of the complexities of human relationships when four friends embark on an existential journey through the underbelly of society. As they drift from city to city, they each struggle to connect with the disenchanted people they encounter along the way. Up Nights speaks to the reality of the human condition: the unequivocal impermanence of life.
Seventeen-year-old Lovisa King comes of age on the Oregon Trail as her family travels from Missouri to the Oregon Territory. Based on the history of a company of real pioneers, A Heart for Any Fate: Westward to Oregon, 1845 tells the story of the King family, whose careful plans are challenged by the harsh, unforeseen realities of overland travel. The Kings make the unfortunate decision to follow guide Stephen Meek, who leads them into blistering weather, drought, and treacherous river crossings along the Terrible Trail. A Heart for Any Fate will be released in conjunction with Oregon’s 150th birthday. Originally published by the Oregon Historical Society, this new edition will include the history of the real King family and a forward written by Jennifer Armstrong.
Hope Friis leads a normal life for any teenager living in Berkeley, California in the 1960s: she hangs out with friends, spends time with her family, and dreams of winning a singing competition and college scholarship despite her pronounced stutter. It seems like she has everything under control, until she takes part in the Free Speech movement that engulfs the city—a choice that could crush her chance of competing.
Life’s private reflections, big and small, shape and define the characters in Eliot Treichel’s debut short story collection. Rural Wisconsin—the lonely, aching expanse of quiet isolation—doubles as a metaphor for the characters who yearn for a closeness in personal relationships that is just out of grasp. A rivalry between lumberjacks reaches a sticky end. A man’s substandard work on his house mirrors his halfhearted attempt to fix his marriage. A little girl’s valorous rescue of mice is lost on her unsentimental father. High school soccer teams, bear cubs, dog sledding—all are masterfully woven together in a landscape that becomes a character in itself. Treichel expertly captures the voice of the individual, allowing any individual, anywhere, who has felt the inescapable pangs of loneliness, to connect to his characters’ aching hearts and quiet plights.
Lincoln’s Daughter completes Tony Wolk’s Lincoln “Out of Time” trilogy about inexplicable, time-traveling Abraham Lincoln, and the widow who gives birth to his daughter. A Lincoln scholar himself, Wolk blends historical facts and people with fictional characters, skillfully bringing time, place, and president to life—once again proving his dedication to both history and literature. It’s 1964, and Abraham Lincoln’s daughter, Sarah, daydreams about meeting her father.
In 1991, war broke out in Croatia. Matko Marušić’s short stories offer a human perspective on the war that is not told in history books. Each story illuminates the love and dedication the Croatian people have for their country, and their struggle to find purpose and meaning in the midst of tragedy. Matko Marušić’s other writings include a novel, a collection of short stories for children, and two additional collections of short stories for adults. Do Angels Cry? Tales of the War was originally published in Croatia and Great Britain in 1996. A preface, written by Dr. Stanimir Vuk-Pavlovic, has been added for the American edition.
Brace yourself for a collision between 1865 and 1955. Joan Matcham has just discovered that she’s pregnant by a man who died ninety years earlier: Abraham Lincoln. His brief sojourn to the Illinois of 1955 ended, he is returned to his own time and place, leaving Joan to deal with the consequences of their night together. Even as friendship, impending motherhood, and a new love revive Joan, she is haunted by recurring visions of the last week of Lincoln’s life. This alternative history tale brings Lincoln’s emotions and thoughts to the modern reader, from 1865, through 1955, all the way to us in the present. With references to Shakespeare, Arabian Nights and others, Tony Wolk’s Good Friday is truly an intimate and compelling story that defies classification and appeals to readers across genres.
Easter weekend, 1955, and Abraham Lincoln finds himself in Evanston, Illinois, mysteriously transported from 1865 at the height of the Civil War. Ninety years after his assassination, this wry, gaunt man, briefly relieved of the burdens of life in his own time, encounters a future society, idealized images of himself, reminiscences of friends and acquaintances long dead, and rare understanding from a woman very different from Mary Todd, his troubled wife. He returns to our nation’s highest office and the bloody conflicts of the War Between the States, a man restored by his experience of the future and determined—as ever—to preserve the Union. Writer and scholar Tony Wolk has been fascinated by Lincoln, “the essence of a good man,” for four decades. In this novel, Wolk skillfully blends history, fantasy, and the writer’s craft to bring Abraham Lincoln to life—Lincoln the man of flesh and blood as well as Lincoln the President. Readers emerge from a mesmerizing read with the sense of having been in Lincoln’s head and in his skin. Henceforth, references to Abraham Lincoln have a personal resonance: “The Father of Us All” is no longer a stranger.
Utopia—we all want our own, but who pays for it and at what price? Croatian poet Dubravka Oraić Tolić’s delivers a masterful, thought-provoking answer with exquisite language and imagery in the epic poem American Scream. As Columbus’s dream of reaching India was interrupted by the discovery of a new land, we too discover unexpected lands in pursuit of our dreams. Complementing American Scream is Palindrome Apocalypse—a palindrome that is artful in both technique and story—presented side-by-side with the Croatian original to preserve its visual effect. Together, Oraić Tolić’ poems:
Triinu Hoffman has to face cruelties like this every day. Shy, intellectual, and living in a rural town, she just doesn’t fit in. She does her best to hide behind her dyed hair and black wardrobe, but it’s still hard to ignore the bullying of Pip Weston and Principal Pinn. It’s even harder to ignore the allure of other girls.
After the devastating loss of her father on a canoe trip meant to bring them closer together, fifteen-year-old Emma Wilson finds herself alone on the river. As she treks out from their remote campsite, she faces wild rapids and a numbing sense of guilt. Back home, Emma confronts the complexity of grief and realizes that leaving the river behind was only the first step forward.
It’s been a year since the Big One―the Cascadia subduction zone earthquake―devastated Portland. While Meryem Zarfati’s injuries have healed and her neighborhood is rebuilding, her mother is still missing. Refusing to give up hope, Meryem continues to search for her mother, even as she learns to live without her in a changed Portland. Along the way, she struggles with her Jewish-Vietnamese heritage and what it means to honor her ancestry. After she receives a magical prayer shawl handed down from her maternal grandmother, a mysterious stranger appears and Meryem is called to save a young girl living in slavery―in sixteenth-century Istanbul. The third companion in the Oregon Book Award–winning Blue Thread series explores how we recover―and rebuild―after the worst has happened.
