Close To The Edge Down By The River

Complex, densely textured literary novel, constructed somewhat loosely around a tornado, a mountain lion attack, and several alternative potentialities, set in Cathar County, Nebraska sometime in the recent past, or perhaps the present, or perhaps the future, rich in biblical allusions and many a pop-cultural reference not to mention the scientific method. Alternatively humorous, heartbreaking, and profound. Featuring characters named Faith and Arch and A. Jacks and Parrish and May and Hanratty and Helen and Horton, and others too numerous to mention, none of whom are less real than any other reality. Faith seeks recovery of a twin son apparently captured by a big cat. Arch seeks to tune in an elusive frequency. A. Jacks seeks to re-construct a Valhalla collapsed by a cyclone. Parish seeks spiritual deliverance in a coming apocalypse. A two-million dollar accidental death insurance policy hands in the balance. Stream of consciousness constructs a beginning, a middle and an end.

Because of his success surviving alone in the wilderness for fifty-four days, fifteen-year-old Brian, profoundly changed by his time in the wild, is asked to undergo a similar experience to help scientists learn more about the psychology of survival.