Showing results by author "James A. Misko" in All Categories

Brothers Richard and Seth Barrett are devoted to running the family ranch on Nebraska's Platte River, and they plan to do so for the rest of their lives. But their mother's will requires them to travel by horse and canoe along the river to understand why their maternal grandfather homesteaded the ranch three generations earlier. From her grave, their mother also commands them to observe the harm that industrial farming has done to the land, air, and water.

The United States Forest Service, Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Land Management, and other government agencies have signed a contract - along with 130 ranchers and farmers and the Nez Pearce Indian Nation - to exchange more than $400 million of property in the largest land deal in Idaho history. Hawk has drained his bank account and borrowed more money to close this transaction. Can he make it through the last week before closing? On the final day, the Indians demand an additional million dollars for one of their properties. Hawk explodes. This could change his life forever.

In his novel The Cut of Pride, Jim Misko does something that is rare in modern literature: He writes about hard, brutal, unpleasant physical labor. And he does so with such vivid detail that the labor itself becomes one of the story’s major entities. His cast of complex, dysfunctional characters - owners and employees of a mink-raising farm in coastal Oregon - is nearly destroyed by the seemingly endless toil. Maintaining a sense of human worth is a constant struggle.

When Bill Williams, a half Irish, half Athabaskan Indian, left his native Alaskan village after a disastrous bear hunt, he left behind not only the only home he had ever known, but also the girl he loved. It was then that the true adventure of his life began. He worked on a Yukon riverboat, searched for gold, and took a job building the Alaskan Highway. When the country became involved in World War II, Bill signed up to fight and was immediately sent overseas. After surviving the Battle of the Bulge, Bill returned home only to discover that his girlfriend was married to his brother.

Miles Foster is a newly minted teacher who dreams of getting a teaching job in the highly respected and financially stable Portland, Oregon, school system where everything is available, and where he and his wife call home. But the only opening for his talents is in a remote lumber mill town in central Oregon, 200 miles away. It is a poor school with 40 students, and is controlled by a jealous superintendent and school board who tolerate no thinking outside the box, and who conspire to destroy his teaching career.