Grand Avenue: A Novel in Stories

by Greg Sarris, Reginald Dyck (Afterword)

Overview

Grand Avenue runs through the center of the Northern California town of Santa Rosa. One stretch of it is home not only to Pomo Indians making a life outside the reservation but also to Mexicans, blacks, and some Portuguese, all trying to find their way among the many obstacles in their turbulent world.

Bound together by a lone ancestor, the lives of the American Indians form the core of these stories—tales of healing cures, poison, family rituals, and a humor that allows the inhabitants of Grand Avenue to see their own foibles with a saving grace.

A teenage girl falls in love with a crippled horse marked for slaughter. An aging healer summons her strength for one final song. A father seeks a bond with his illegitimate son. A mother searches for the power to care for her cancer-stricken daughter’s spirit. Here is a tapestry of lives rendered with the color, wisdom, and a quest for meaning that are characteristic of the traditional storytelling in which they are rooted, a tradition Sarris grew up hearing and learning. Vibrant with the emotions and realities of a changing world, these narratives—the basis of an HBO miniseries—are all equally stunning and from the heart.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780806148342
Publisher:	University of Oklahoma Press
Publication date:	03/31/2015
Series:	American Indian Literature and Critical Studies Series , #65
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	248
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.53(d)
Lexile:	660L (what's this?)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Greg Sarris is author of the anthology Keeping Slug Woman Alive: A Holistic Approach to American Indian Texts, the novel Watermelon Nights, and scripts for screen and stage. He is Chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria and holds the Endowed Chair in Native American Studies at Sonoma State University.


Reginal Dyck is Professor of English at Capital University. His research and writing focus on the work of Native American authors, including Greg Sarris.

What People are Saying About This

Sherman Alexie

"Greg Sarris's stories go way back and they look far ahead, writes the good stories that our grandmothers have told for thousands of years....He has made himself an exciting new part of the latest Native American literary renaissance."

Ron Hansen

"Grand Avenue is a very find colleciton, reminescent, for me, of Winesburg, Ohio. Greg's eyes are clear and his voice is true."

Peter Matthiessen

"Intelligent, humorous and poignant -- a very promising new writer."

Editorial Reviews

“Greg Sarris . . . has made himself an exciting new part of the latest Native American Literary Renaissance, but his stories go way back and they look far ahead, like the good stories that our grandmothers have told for thousands of years. Greg Sarris . . . has listened closely to their stories, and we should all listen closely to his.”—Sherman Alexie, author of The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven


“I admire Greg Sarris’s sense of the gritty passion of life. A resonant thread of myth and laughter pulls the tales together. He allows the story to overtake him, the sign of a fine storyteller.”—Joy Harjo author of She Had Some Horses and In Mad Love and War

From the Publisher