Some people hit rock bottom. In Alaskan Humble Pie by Natasha Von Imhof, rock star Ryder Hartley hits it on stage, in front of a crowd, blanking out on the words of his own lyrics. He flees the stage only to run straight into a...

Glenscott Thomas Copper’s Angels Dance on the Head of a Pin follows Scott Rankin, a small red-haired Catholic boy from 1962 La Crosse, after his family’s breakup pushes him from St. John’s parish school toward Chicago. Scott wants to become the priest his Italian grandmother...

Mark Guillerman pens a sweeping historical novel in A Heart That’s True, set in the aftermath of the 19th-century Indian Wars. The novel follows two Lakota children, twelve-year-old Joseph Cross, named Blue Thunder at birth, and his cousin, White Cloud, as they are ripped away...

True North’s Anasazi Vision follows True after she spends a year caring for her severely ill mother, whose death leaves her unable to stay in the empty Southern Oregon house. True returns to the Four Corners region and prepares for a ten-day vision quest at...

Robert Dyer’s A Small Memory is set in 1975 Ohio, where Mike arrives at Appleton College as a freshman basketball recruit and takes a live-in counselor job at a group home run through the HOPE Agency. Ted Dirksen, his best friend and roommate, already works...

American Gyro by Jim Zervanos follows eighteen-year-old Johnny Demos, the grandson of a Greek restaurateur in Kornfield, Pennsylvania, after a school play gives him a first taste of acting. Papou’s death leaves the Old Kornfield Inn in Uncle Nick’s hands, and Johnny is expected to...

“There’s no such thing as a whole, functional, fuck-up-free human. We all have our problems and things that prevent us from being perfect.” True, and that may include Nicholas Bruechle, author of the novel All Writers Are Liars. At the very least, his characters certainly...

Robert Frost once wrote, “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” In Autumn Ridge by Micaiah Munro, that sense of home is tied to a quiet cabin in Montana, where family history and personal struggles...

In Danila Botha’s A Place for People Like Us, Hannah meets Jillian during a night out and, after reconnecting in a university class, moves into her apartment, where their relationship centers on filming Jillian’s music and building a shared routine. While studying, Hannah is paired...

Bernadette Gage’s A Beautiful Sunrise begins in rural Ipole. Young Abi attends school because her father, Pa Okoh, refuses to accept the customs that reserve education for boys. His decision sends her away from home while she is still a child, places her in mission...