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by John Mort (Author)
Down Along the Piney is John Mort's fourth short-story collection and winner of the Richard Sullivan Prize in Short Fiction. With settings in Florida, California, Mexico, Chicago, the Texas Panhandle, and, of course, the Ozarks themselves, these thirteen stories portray the unsung, amusing, brutal, forever hopeful lives of ordinary people. Mort chronicles the struggles of "flyover" people who live not just in the Midwest, but anywhere you can find a farm, small town, or river winding through forested hills. Mort, whose earlier stories have appeared in the New Yorker, GQ, and The Chicago Tribune, is the author of the award-winning Vietnam War novel Soldier in Paradise, as well as Goat Boy of the Ozarks and The Illegal. These ironic, unflaggingly honest stories will remind the reader of Jim Harrison, Sherwood Anderson, and Shirley Jackson.
Author Biography
John Mort's first novel, Soldier in Paradise, won the W. Y. Boyd Award for best military fiction. He has published seven other books, including the story collections Tanks, The Walnut King, and Dont Mean Nothin: Vietnam War Stories. John Mort served in Vietnam with the First Cavalry and afterward attended the University of Iowa, receiving MFA and MLS degrees. He is a member of the Western Writers of America and in 2013 won a Spur Award for his short story, "The Hog Whisperer," included in this volume. He lives in southern Missouri where he raises vegetables and fruit.
