Bøger af Heather Mateus Sappenfield

Lyrics for Rock Stars is a collection of seventeen stories¿some historical, some contemporary- all set in the West. Involving skiers, ranchers, cyclists, suffragettes, tourists, super models, dead pigs, burro racers, religious beet farmers, immigrant miners, scorned lovers, penitent centenarians, and musicians, they are as varied as the region's landscape. Some involve kids surviving the choices of the adults around them. Some involve those adults. Three of the stories are humorous. In one story, a fourteen-year-old girl's sexual awakening takes form in a crush on an older cowboy as she starts to understand her parents' rocky history. In another, an eight-year-old girl is forced to comfort her pregnant mother on the night her father has left for another woman. In the title story, a very pregnant gold-digger understands the error of her ways and, spurred by a meeting with a singing hippie, tries to start a new life. All of the stories explore how society's values clash with our individual desires, and the ways we weave our lives through these opposing forces, often creating not of a lifeline, but a noose.

"On an ordinary Monday, Rill Kruse left for third grade with a dad, but when she came home, he'd been stolen. By a river. One year and thirteen days later--on the first morning of summer vacation--Rill still insists he's trudging home. Her mom has become a practical woman. Her older brother, Eddy, now calls her baby and dork. Gus, second-in-command at Kruse Whitewater Adventures, Rill's family's rafting company, has gone from being her dad's "risk bro" to her mom's guardian angel. Joyce, company secretary, arm-wrestler, and mechanic, still calls Rill a fingerling, but, after learning what a cheater water is, Rill wishes she'd stop. When Rill's cat, Clifford, leads her to the family tree fort on the mountainside behind home, she discovers a stowaway, Perla. To help Perla, Rill embarks on an adventure that tests her understanding of the world, of loss, and of what it means to be a friend. In the end, what Rill discovers will nudge her--and all those she loves--toward healing."--