The Middle of Elsewhere

the long version

"There is no map of The Middle of Elsewhere. It's a territory bordered by Far Left Field and Off the Beaten Track, both in exterior and interior ways. The collection begins with a middle-aged couple venturing forth to reclaim their lost youth in the ghost town of Terlingua, far west Texas. The book continues with a woman in the Ozarks building a doll-house shrine to Elvis as a hedge against time. A woman snakehandler in the trans-Pecos faces her demons the hard way. A visionary half-breed boy in Nussa Tengarra, Indonesia, commits a sin that brings the wrath of a whale upon his village. A young woman in El Paso accidentally kills a bicyclist from El Salvador and goes on a journey to discover him. A musician buries his brother in the Mojave Desert along with his guitar. A young chambermaid leaves a letter to the people of the future in a time capsule in Arkansas. The book comes full circle back to Texas with two children riding an Orphan Train past the point of no return."--BOOK JACKET.