Alaskan: Stories From the Great Land. John Smelcer

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      From the Print Edition

      “John Smelcer is Alaska’s modern day Jack London.”

      —W. P. Kinsella, Field of Dreams

      “A celebration of the diversity of cultures. Undeniably important!”

      —James Michener, ALASKA

      “This writer speaks from the land, and for the land, and the people who belong to it.”

      —Ursula K. Le Guin

      “John Smelcer is an Alaskan literary treasure.”

      —Jay Hammond, former Governor of Alaska

      “One of our best writers. Few people can afford not to have his writing in their library.”

      —Denise Levertov

      “A compelling voice, unforgettable and highly recommended.”

      —Library Bookwatch

      “A talented storyteller.”

      —Tony Hillerman

      Books by John Smelcer

      Fiction

      Lone Wolves

      The Trap

      The Great Death

      Native Studies

      The Raven and the Totem

      A Cycle of Myths

      In the Shadows of Mountains

      Trickster

      The Day That Cries Forever

      Durable Breath

      Native American Classics

      We are the Land, We are the Sea

      Poetry

      The Indian Prophet

      Songs from an Outcast

      Riversong

      Without Reservation

      Beautiful Words

      Tracks

      Raven Speaks

      Changing Seasons

      Alaskan

      Stories from the Great Land

      John Smelcer

      Leapfrog Press

      Fredonia, New York

      Alaskan © 2014 by John Smelcer

      All rights reserved under International and

      Pan-American Copyright Conventions

      No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a data base or other retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, by any means, including mechanical, electronic, photocopy, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

      This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

      Cover art ©2014 by Larry Vienneau

      eBook published in 2014 in the United States by

      Leapfrog Press LLC

      PO Box 505

      Fredonia, NY 14063

      www.leapfrogpress.com

      Print edition originally published in 2011 by

      Standing Stone Books, Syracuse, NY

      Printed in the United States of America

      Distributed in the United States by

      Consortium Book Sales and Distribution

      St. Paul, Minnesota 55114

      www.cbsd.com

      E-ISBN: 978-1-935248-69-9

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Information is available from the Library of Congress.

      for Ted Stevens, Alaskan

      Acknowledgements

      Over the past quarter-century, many writers have helped shape these stories. The most important and most enduring is my longtime editor and father-figure, Bard Young. He is my harshest critic, and I love him for that. Every writer should have such a mentor. Also, I received a great deal of incite from Rod Clark. During my years as a Fellow at Binghamton University, Jamie Wriston-Colbert and Jack Vernon gave me useful advice on the craft of writing fiction. I’d also like to thank James Michener, James Dickey, Ursula K. LeGuin, Denise Levertov, John Updike, John Gardner, Saul Bellow, Bill Kinsella, Norman Mailer, James Welch, Ralph Ellison, Michael Dorris, Frank McCourt, Ray Bradbury, and J. D. Salinger. I’d also like to thank Larry Vienneau for the striking cover design.

      Stories in this collection have appeared in the following periodicals: Aurora, Powder, Provincetown Arts, Pearl, Witness, Quick Fiction, Talkeetna Times, Fiction International, Rosebud, Buffalo Carp, Prairie Schooner, and Terminus.

Contents

      Contents

      Acknowledgements

       Contents

      Introduction to Alaskan

      Sunday Drive

      The Pond

      Darkness

      The Bear

      The Mammoth Eaters

      River’s Edge

      The Awakening

      The Death of Charley Secondchief

      A Stroke Before Midnight

      The White Hills of Denali

      The Walrus Hunters

      The Abduction of Lucy Secondchief

      White Moon on Black Water

      A Walk in the Wind

      Willie Paniaq’s Secret

      Solitary Man

      New Year’s Resolution

      The Ties That Bind

      A Quiet Recess of Winter

      The Lake

      The Berry Pickers

      The Lost Journal of the 1886-87 Swedish Polar Expedition to Alaska

      Crash

      The Boys Who Would Be Men

      The Owl That Heard His Name

      The Author

      Introduction to Alaskan

      This selection of stories represents almost thirty years of writing. Ronald Reagan was president when some of these stories first made their way onto paper. For me, the storytelling process began in the early-to-mid 1980s, when I was an undergraduate student majoring in anthropology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (my mother might say it began in the early ‘70s when I used to sit and write stories, some of which she kept). At the time, James Michener was prowling the university’s Rasmussen Library, researching for a historical nonfiction book about Alaska. Michener had a stark little office in the English Department, and I used to walk past it every day. Eventually, we struck up a conversation. For the rest of his residency, we spoke almost daily and lunched together often in the Wood Center, the university’s cavernous student union building. It was during those lunches that we brainstormed the title for his book-in-progress.