June 3, 2014 - For more than 20 years Bemidji writer Kent Nerburn has walked a fine line. He's tried to respectfully explore Native American culture as a white author.His books "Neither Wolf nor Dog" and "Wolf at Twilight," tell of his complex relationship with a Lakota elder named Dan. He's now completed the trilogy with "The Girl Who Sang to the Buffalo" which delves into Native spirituality. Nerburn says it was also the most difficult of the trilogy to write. "In my own way, with such talents or such spiritual capabilities as I had, I prayed for guidance on this."As in the others in the series the new book tells of a road trip Nerburn takes with his friend Dan. Dan is a real person, a Lakota elder approaching the end of his life. Like all the characters in Nerburn's trilogy, though, Dan is not his real name. Nerburn has renamed everyone except himself.Dan is surrounded by a group of very protective friends and relatives. They regularly warn off Nerburn if they think he is getting too close, telling him he has no place in the native community. "The Girl Who Sang to the Buffalo" Courtesy New World LibraryHowever, for reasons Nerburn doesn't understand, Dan keeps pulling him back. The man needs to resolve some questions before he dies -- most importantly, what happened to his sister. She was taken to a boarding school and never returned. Dan wants Nerburn's help to find out what happened.In the first half of the 20th century the U.S. government placed thousands of native children in such schools. They were often far from their homes and families, and the experience scarred entire generations. In the new book, Nerburn writes about a place that may have been worse.
November 8, 2013 - When hard-living, hard-partying Texas cowboy Ron Woodroof received some very bad news in 1985, he likely had no idea that his life would inspire a movie.
July 16, 2013 - A new novel from a Minneapolis small press links blends elements of a spy thriller, a romance, history, philosophy and environmental concerns about the future of the planet. The New York Times raved about author J.M. Ledgard's "Submergence " calling it "a book obsessed with unexplored depths, whether of self, of world conflict or of the ocean." Euan Kerr reports Coffee House Press says the national publishing houses passed over the book, but it's exactly the material Coffee House seeks.
April 16, 2013 - In an unlikely collaboration double Tony Award winning actor Mark Rylance joins forces with Duluth poet Louis Jenkins to create a new play about ice fishing at the Guthrie.
March 13, 2013 - MPR’s Euan Kerr reports on Penumbra Theatre mounting its first show after almost closing its doors.
March 12, 2013 - MPR’s Euan Kerr profiles the Penumbra Theatre staging of Spunk, three short stories of Zora Neale Hurston adapted by Jelly's Last Jam writer George C. Wolfe.
February 6, 2013 - Australian guitarist Ben Frost lives and draws inspiration from his home in Iceland, where he creates ambient music. The result is a visceral listening experience.
January 15, 2013 - A man beset with the problem of an overfull fishpond, a student who has to face a grinning skull as he eats his Froot Loops, and a young girl preparing for the Rapture which is due to begin in a couple of hours. These are all characters in Minnesota writer Scott Dominic Carpenter's new collection of short stories "This Jealous Earth." Carpenter claims the stories came about as a distraction from other writing.
August 8, 2012 - Austin Minnesota native Amanda Hocking set out to earn a couple of hundred bucks to go see a show in Chicago one summer, but ended up becoming an internet publishing sensation and multi-millionaire. Now she's made the jump to printed books with a new series about murderous Sirens. She stresses however she's just looking for a quiet life in Minnesota.
May 14, 2012 - MPR’s Euan Kerr profiles Twin Cities native Maya Washington, who uses a short film she created about a deaf performance poet to challenge elementary school students to think about - and perform poetry.