Books by Terese Svoboda

Water, its use and abuse, trickles through Great American Desert, a story collection by Terese Svoboda that spans the misadventures of the prehistoric Clovis people to the wanderings of a forlorn couple around a pink pyramid in a sci-fi prairie. In "Dutch Joe," the eponymous hero sees the future from the bottom of a well in the Sandhills, while a woman tries to drag her sister back from insanity in "Dirty Thirties." In "Bomb Jockey," a local Romeo disposes of leaky bombs at South Dakota''s army depot, while a family quarrels in "Ogallala Aquifer" as a thousand trucks dump chemical waste from a munitions depot next to their land. Bugs and drugs are devoured in "Alfalfa," a disc jockey talks her way out of a knifing in "Sally Rides," and an updated Pied Piper begs parents to reconsider in "The Mountain." The consequences of the land''s mistreatment is epitomized in the final story by a discovery inside a pink pyramid. In her arresting and inimitable style, Svoboda''s delicate handling of the complex dynamics of family and self seeps into every sentence of these first-rate short stories about what we do to the world around us-and what it can do to us. 

Poetry. PROFESSOR HARRIMAN'S STEAM AIR-SHIP charts a contemporary landscape of violence and death while reaching for joy and aiming for flight. This courageous, powerful collection stands among Svoboda's finest work.

A funny yet poignant, time-shifting story of the plains that transcends its interstate spine and exposes us to a whole new level of Svoboda's fiery prose

Young Harriet's father sells her as a slave to settle his gambling debt with an eccentric Indian - and her story is just beginning. Part Huck Finn, part True Grit, Harriet's story of her encounter with the dark and brutal history of the American West is a true original.