Focuses on the profound impact that the author's Midwestern roots have had on his songs, politics, and prophetic character.

Pichaske's stories take us from the halls of academe to small-town Minnesota to a little village on the edge of the Bavarian National Forest. Speaking in voices of a farmer right out of Deliverance, a disgruntled Professor of English, and his dog Harley, Pichaske says what many people think, but few have the courage to say. While he is especially strong on details of history, place, and language, the hard-nosed wisdom his narrators offer transcends place and even time.

From "Daisy":
Look--there are always dreams. And in dreams the ultimate purity: by now she may be fat and forty,...