Crazy for Trying — Joni Rodgers

Think Jane Eyre with Rock 'n' Roll—Houston PressIn this brave and beautiful debut novel, star-crossed lovers, dysfunctional families, and comically flawed friends blaze a fresh trail through the romantic badlands and strident sexual politics of 1970s Montana. Zaftig late-night disc jockey Tulsa Bitters discovers the power of invisibility when the sound of her voice draws an intriguing stranger out of the dark. Vietnam vet Mac White Wolf MacPeters—half Blackfoot, half raging Irish—is smitten with Tulsa’s wry intelligence, and she’s won over by his careful courtship.Friends and drinking buddies disapprove of the unlikely affair, but for a while, Tulsa’s love-struck tenacity allows Mac to pretend that things might actually work out. She holds fast to her belief in Mac’s threadbare sanity, knowing that ghosts and coyotes are just out of earshot, waiting to spirit him back into the shadows of a dangerous Western solitude.