Squaw Valley post no. 8

Last night Dorothy Allison wowed the conference again -- her talk on the event's second day had been the best thing so far -- with a reading from a forthcoming novel. Not sure if the book has a title yet, but Allison said it was about violence and its consequences. She read a searing passage depicting violence against a group of nuns and workers in El Salvador during the war there two decades ago. It was a long, passionate, excruciatingly detailed depiction of violence, showing the inhumanity and the humanity of both the perpetrators and the victims. The audience was stunned.

It didn't exactly prepare people for any parties that night. At my house, everyone said they were wrung out, from the reading as much as from the whole week, which is now reaching its end; everyone stayed in and read or went to bed.

Over at Ghost Word, Frances Dinkelspiel runs down the agents' panel that was held here Wednesday.