Author Molly Gloss Reads From Her Latest Novel
Posted By: Liz Goodrich
Date Posted: 7/29/2008
"Like people everywhere in the world, I’m a sucker for the cowboy myth and its romantic images," says author Molly Gloss about her newly published novel Heart of Horses, set in Eastern Oregon. Gloss, an award-winning author, will read and discuss her book when she visits the Bend Library on Sunday, August 10, 2008 at 3:00 p.m. as part of the monthly Second Sunday celebration of the written word. This program is free and open to the public.
Gloss, a fourth-generation Oregonian, lives in Portland. In 1996 she was the recipient of a prestigious Whiting Writers’ Award. Her novel The Jump-Off Creek is a Pacific Northwest classic, a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, and winner of the Oregon Book Award and the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Award. The Dazzle of Day, a novel of the near future, received the PEN West Fiction Prize and was a New York Times Notable Book. Wild Life, set in the woods and mountains of Washington State at the turn of the twentieth century, won the James Tiptree Award. The Hearts of Horses, recently released, takes place during the winter of 1917 among the farms and ranches of Eastern Oregon, and has already garnered widespread attention and praise in the national press
“I’ve had this book in mind for about fifteen years, since first hearing about girls and young women who were breaking horses in the early decades of the twentieth century,” says Gloss of her newest novel. Researching her topic took her to an Idaho family ranch where spent a few weeks reacquainting herself with horses. “I was able to soak up a lot of information and stories about ranching and horse breaking, some of which make it into the novel,” says Gloss. She also attended BLM mustang adoptions and under the guidance of Lesley Neuman, learned how to “start” a wild horse
Gloss didn't start writing seriously until she was 35. She confesses that she always liked writing, but that she "grew up in a period when smart girls were encouraged to be teachers or nurses. Nobody ever told me I could be a writer." After graduating from Portland State University in 1966 with a degree in social science and English, Gloss married and then taught briefly at a junior high school. She sold her first short story, the result of journals kept after the birth of her son Ben, in 1981. Since then she has authored works of fiction, more than two-dozen short stories, essays and book reviews.
This program is free and open to the public. For more information about this or other library programs, please call 312-1032 or visit www.dpls.us. People with disabilities needing accommodations (alternative formats, seating or auxiliary aides) should contact Liz at 312-1032.
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