Bibliophile

Kevin Maloney deftly draws you into a Quixote-like tale that begins in Beaverton.

Pilgrim Power

Humor and drama on the journey to find the meaning of life interview by Cathy Carroll “This is the story of a pilgrim named Kevin Maloney,” we learn in the prologue to the novel The Red-Headed Pilgrim, autobiographical fiction by Kevin Maloney. Our hero hails from Beaverton, “a suburb of Portland the way the Monkees are a suburb of the Beatles.” A twisted JV football drill sends him running for the forest, sparking an existential crisis. His parents line up a therapist who offers him a copy of Siddhartha, and his pilgrimage eventually ensues. Think On the Road meets Napoleon Dynamite in the latest from this Portland-based author. You’ve said that half of writing is skill and half from how you live your life. Can you elaborate? When I was younger, I used to be dazzled by fancy sentences in books. I still am, but as I’ve gotten older, I…

Award-winning essayist Laurie Easter pens a rich memoir, All the Leavings.

Wild Terrain

A writer living off the grid navigates the wilds of nature and the human heart interview by Cathy Carroll Laurie Easter lives off the grid on twenty-eight forested acres in a funky little cabin on the edge of wilderness in southern Oregon. Her essays have been awarded fellowships by the prestigious Vermont Studio Center and Playa in Summer Lake, published in many literary journals and anthologies, nominated for a Pushcart Prize and listed as notable in The Best American Essays 2015. She holds degrees from Southern Oregon University and Vermont College of Fine Arts. All the Leavings, being released in October by OSU Press, is her first book. The memoir navigates the rugged terrain of an alternative lifestyle and the hazards of the human heart, from encounters with cougars and the dynamics of mother-child relationships, to the destructive power of wildfires, the home birth of her second child and community…