Strohm Alley — M. Bryce Ternet

Brian Holliday is a man haunted by his dreams and memories of an alleyway known as Strohm Alley. He ponders how his memories may intermingle with his dreams, while struggling to hide from both. The blurred memory of a childhood incident on a humid summer day in Northern Indiana is seemingly inescapable, and the memory is promulgated by those around him, both benignly and malignantly. As Brian wrestles with confronting his past and how it has determined his present, he faces the question of whether or not he is prepared to interpret his own existence. The story's setting in fictional Tarkington, Indiana, becomes a central character of its own as a place seeking to define its own identity.