Precincts of Light
Precincts of Light
Set against the background of the Measure Nine (anti-gay rights) crisis in Oregon in the early 1990s, a brother and sister, both newly out, try to recover the lost affections of their children. Their combined quests are explored from five points of view in a novel of continuously rich and poetic language. The voices of Joanne (poet and mother), Harold (minister and father), Appleton (retired law professor and grandfather), Eleanor (collectibles broker and grandmother), and Samuel (politician, father and secret member of the homophobic Oregon Protection Alliance) comprise a book that explores diversity, the possibilities of a potentially peaceable kingdom-the precincts of light. The characters move, each in his or her own faltering way, towa
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Women, Class And Education (Women and Social Class)
Making use of theory, reflection, narrativity and auto/biographical writing, Jane Thompson provides a comprehensive understanding of what learning really means, and what education can contribute to the struggles of working class women intent on changing the circumstances of their lives. Organized into three parts, in the first section, Thompson draws on autobiographical experience to root theoretical understanding in the authority of personal knowledge. In part two, she illustrates how theoretical analysis can inform arguments about women’s changing relationships to class, community, consciousness and education. In the final part, she provides detailed examples of educational work she has been involved in with working class women. Conta
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Precincts of Light,
The eccentricities of JD Salinger’s Glass family–rare, tender, exotic, and somehow slightly inbred–are roughly suggested in the family at the center of Henry Alley’s Precincts of Light. But where Salinger had given us a family made opaque in their complexity, Alley gives us a family made transparent to each other by the strenuous demands of grassroots politics, bigotry, disappointment, religion and loyalties.
Placed in Oregon’s LGBT political struggles of the 1990s, Precincts of Light is a novel that comfortably transcends the decades in its clarity, emotional dynamic, and insights. The challenges we’ve seen associated with the LGBT movement over the last two generations, including those of marriage and family equality, privacy, respect, and equal opportunity and safety, are fleshed out in Precincts of Light. The immediacy of the experience is given form through the sometimes self-serving battles of family members, the urge for power that colors philosophical positions, and the hearts and minds, the lives of real people at stake in the outcome.
As much as its readability, the characters and the story itself, I recommend Precincts of Light for its sense of historic necessity. It offers overdue reflections or a window into the sufferings, losses and wins for families going through the confrontation of fears associated with difference and diversity. The novel touches the faults and virtues, the language, hopes and goals in the background of a revolution that’s fought on home turf.
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|Going deeper,
Though a long time civil and human rights supporter, as a straight man I could not fathom the ripple effects bigotry has on family members. Hank Alley’s book took me on journey beyond the issues of any one individual and brings to light how all families bear the burden of ignorance, no matter their orientation. Families, like the spider web, feel the reverberation throughout their ties with each other, pluck on one, everyone feels it. It is beautifully and sensitively written, giving voice to a wide range of perspectives.
This book should be a must read for everyone, gay or straight. It deals with serious issues with poetic elegance.
Mike Young
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|light out of darkness,
Henry Alley’s new novel is a good read, especially for those who are interested in the gay rights movement and its history. Alley centers his book around a real 1992 Oregon ballot measure. Measure 9 attempted to add anti-LGBT language to the Oregon Constitution. Alley remembers this ugly time through the voices of a family of characters. Each character gradually comes to life as each struggles with the political turmoil and with his/her inner convictions. This is Alley at his best.
Throughout his novel Alley promotes the thought that beauty can be found in many forms. Alley often takes the reader on delightful descriptive journeys of forests, of backyard gardens, of antiques, and of male beauty. Perhaps Alley intends to relieve some of the building tension, perhaps to recognize diversity, or perhaps just because he does it so well.
Ballot Measure 9 was handily defeated. It was a turning point against intolerance and for diversity. This well crafted book is important because it helps some to remember and others to know about this historical part of the gay rights movement.
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