In a small town, three childhood friends— Julie, John, and Robert— forge an unbreakable bond beneath the sprawling branches of a maple tree. As kids, Julie dazzles them with her imaginative adaptations of Shakespeare, igniting their dreams of adventure. Now adults, they' ve taken divergent paths: Julie becomes a globe-trotting activist, Robert a successful lawyer, and John a passionate environmental crusader, often finding himself in trouble for his bold stand against pollution. As John ba...

In a quiet, unassuming town, three strangers find their lives intertwined by an event that seems anything but ordinary— an unsettling murder that casts a long shadow over the community. As the story unfolds, each of these three unique individuals takes their turn sharing their journey of discovering the others. What begins as a dark mystery soon reveals itself to be a tale of unexpected connections, a hidden love story, and the unraveling of one person' s deeply unusual past. At the heart ...

For readers of Winesburg, Ohio and To Kill a Mockingbird, Michael Strelow weaves the story of a town and its mysteries in this lyrical debut novel and Oregon Book Award FinalistMichael Strelow weaves the story of a town and its mysteries in his debut novel, The Greening of Ben Brown, an Oregon Book Award Finalist for fiction 2005. Ben Brown, the protagonist, becomes a citizen of East Leven, Oregon, after he recovers from an electrocution ...