Introduction to
Stray Dogs: Writing from the Other America
Better to seem to lose the battle and actually win, than to seem to win the battle and actually lose. Sometimes the seeming loser is in truth the victor. One must know the definition of victory before one engages the enemy.
—Sun Tzu, The Art of War
This book is not for the weak at heart or easily offended. Stray Dogs is a head-on collision with life. There are no airbags, safety glass or roll bars in this vehicle. The stories, poetry and lyrics that you will read and hear about are indeed closer than they appear in your side view mirror. For indeed the other America is our America. It is the home of fractured dreams and failed ambitions. It is war out there. Like it or not. The losers are the victors.
In a 1975 Fiction! Interview with Northern California novelists, Don Carpenter, author of Hard Rain Falling, was asked, “What does it take to be a good writer?”
His answer was a simple one: “Luck. Talent. Energy. Love. Madness. And the ability to throw your entire life away for what you want. Courage, in short.” Add the necessary honesty and objectivity to deconstruct life to its stark, basic landscape and you are left with the brutal truth, beautifully rendered. No subterfuge. No innuendo.
All of these talented writers, poets and musicians included in this collection are anything but stray dogs. They are more like free-range purveyors of our lives. Told with unabashed candidness, their talents are readily appreciated as one after the other demonstrates the principles that Don Carpenter used to judge a good writer. Make no mistake about this.
Writing from the other America, the marginalized, the discarded and the losers are given a voice that can be heard loud and clear by these talented writers. No matter if it is Vicky Hendrick’s “M-F Dog,” Eric Miles Williamson’s “Some Get-Back,” Willy Vlautin’s “Lorna,” Chris Offutt’s “High Water Everywhere,” Chris Hedges’ “Remarks,” Joseph D. Haske’s “Smelt,” Ron Cooper’s “The Art of Carving,” Michael Gill’s “27 Trap,” Patrick Michael Finn’s “Where Cat Scratch and Happy Valley Meet,” Daniel Woodrell’s “Johanna Stull,” Sherman Alexie’s “One Stick Song,” Mark Turcotte’s “Road Noise,” Larry Fondation’s “Cross Dressing,” Steven Huff’s “An American Uncle,” poetry by Esther Belin, lyrics by Dickey Betts and Jason Isbell, you will be left shaken, disturbed and wonderfully alive. Enjoy.
—Lou Boxer