A Greek Odyssey in the American West begins with Helen Papanikolas discussing her childhood in Helper, Utah. Helper's population was as odd a conglomeration as could be found anywhere in the West: French sheepherders; Chinese and Japanese restaurant owners; African American, Greek, and Italian rail and coal workers; and finally, Mormon, Jewish, and Slav businessmen settled in and around Helper, a way station for the Denver and Rio Grande Western railroad. This book, however, is not Papanikolas's life story but the story of her parent's individual emigrations to the United States, their...

Helen Papanikolas has been honored frequently for her work in ethnic and labor history. Among her many publications are Toil and Rage in a New Land: The Greek Immigrants in Utah, Peoples of Utah (ed.), and her parents' own story of migration, Emily-George. With Small Bird, Tell Me, she joins a long and ancient tradition of Greek story-tellers whose art informs and enriches our lives.

The title of Helen Papanikolas second collection of short stories, "The Apple Falls from the Apple Tree," is taken from an old Greek proverb and speaks of the new generation s struggle with the vestiges of Greek customs. Gone are the raw, overt emotions of the pioneers, their bold prejudices, and, especially, the haunting black fatalism of funerals. Yet their children retain much of their parents culture. Although they live far from the old Greek towns, we see their rivalries, envy of the successful, and hubris as they respond to their experiences of intermarriage, old age, and loss. The...

... Evocative portraits...of a culture caught in its dying but still resonant last moments. -- Kirkus Reviews Writers like Papanikolas should live a thousand years. -- Journal of the International Greek Folklore Society

In 1906 a young, semiliterate Greek arrived in America with a fewdollars in his pocket and his people's legacy of proverbs, superstitions, and cultural traits to guide him through the dangers and opportunities of a new world. "The Time of the Little Black Bird" begins with the story of this young man and his plan to build a future for his family as it makes its way in America.
Told in a clear-eyed yet compassionate voice, "The Time of the Little Black Bird" is a novel of generations, loyalty, betrayal, tradition, and greed. Centering on a family business that grows from a few shabby...

In 1906 a young, semiliterate Greek arrived in America with a few dollars in his pocket and his people's legacy of proverbs, superstitions, and cultural traits to guide him through the dangers and opportunities of a new world. The Time of the Little Black Bird begins with the story of this young man and his plan to build a future for his family as it makes its way in America.

The boys and men who left their Greek valley and mountain villages in the early 1900s for America came with amulets their mothers had made for them. Some were miniature sacks attached to a necklace; more often they were merely a square of fabric enclosing the values of their lives: a piece of a holy book or a sliver of the True Cross representing their belief in Greek Orthodoxy; a thyme leaf denoting their wild terrain; a blue bead to ward off the Evil Eye; and a pinch of Greek earth.
In her evocative and meticulously researched book "An Amulet of Greek Earth," author Helen Papanikolas...