Novels, poetry, memoir, and stories Gary Jeshel Forrester

forrester @ tomb of french novelist sidonie-gabrielle colette, cimetière du père-lachaise, paris, 2012

following demise of rank strangers in 1990s, forrester turned writing novels , poetry, focus on music , family. houseboating in ozarks (dufour editions, 2006), includes fictional accounts of bluegrass band, story of circular journey through american midwest, reflective detours australia, south america, japan, , italy. houseboating in ozarks meanders through tribal , western spiritual traditions, including of aboriginal australia , lakota sundances in green grass, south dakota, led yuwipi medicine man frank fools crow. st. louis post-dispatch found houseboating in ozarks idiosyncratic engaging: autobiographical extended meditation on difficulty of preserving familial , social memory, , sustaining , transmitting values , culture in our mobile, throwaway society.

a 2012 review of houseboating said 1 of many wonders of book [the main character s] 2 kids become real people capable of influencing outcome of trip. grab him heart , throw him around. bright, funny, , embody own kind of irony meshes dad s . . . wonderful, smart, sad book. lawyers , poetry described houseboating in ozarks autobiographical in sense robert pirsig s zen , art of motorcycle maintenance life of robert pirsig.

his second novel, connoisseur of love, published in new zealand in 2012. novel contains 12 meditations – dozen episodes endgame of peter becker, wellington s self-styled connoisseur of love. peter not quite @ home in adopted city of wellington, there no place on earth rather be. creature of routine, eccentric public servant, estranged child katrin , ex-wife sylvia. alone, stalks wellington s second-hand shops , cafés, bicycles through streets , lanes, battles on tennis courts, , performs music – never quite connecting or anything.

fishhead: wellington s magazine described connoisseur of love comprehensive love song new zealand s capital city, exudes wellington. according fishhead, s not novel wellington, s novel wellington. review in emerging writers network declared connoisseur smartly written in forrester s straightforward clear sentences have had echo of vonnegut , , novel created unique point of view broad @ once gordian knot of irony, psychological landscape, , state of mind.

in feature article in wellington s dominion post newspaper, forrester described lawyer, public servant, bluegrass musician, , author of novel set in wellington. on paper s being writer counts. dominion post article captured peter becker s sense of alienation, observing forrester made peter becker , planted him outsider in wellington, stumbling through familiar places , unsatisfactory relationships – peter becker alien in wellington. doesn t pretend wellingtonian. has nose pressed against glass.

the germans have word peter becker s underlying sense not well: torschlusspanik – literally, gate-closing panic – or in peter s case, quiet angst of aging life s options narrow. not long ago, seemed have time in world; world shrinking, , grace has not arrived.

begotten, not made, forrester s third novel, recounts travels of wandering musician , deaf sidekick, shuffling along on doomed walking marathon new york san francisco in 1920s. lengthy extract begotten, not made published in 2007 university of nebraska press, in scoring second, anthology featuring works of thirty accomplished writers north america, including michael chabon, andre dubus, , others. begotten, not made written entirely in free verse in voice of demented brer rabbit.

forrester s fourth novel, more deaths one, published in 2014 in special edition of legal studies forum, journal established american legal studies association promote humanistic, critical, trans-disciplinary legal studies, , featuring works of poetry, essays, memoirs, stories, , criticism. more deaths 1 picaresque journey new zealand america, in search of central illinois roots of late novelist david foster wallace, 21st century cultural paradigm known metamodernism, , meaning of life. according new zealand writer , poet jillian sullivan, more deaths 1 amazing; beautifully cadenced , such clear, intelligent writing. reads classic. 1 man s honest , vulnerable take on life (and intelligent, educated, thoughtful take).

poems forrester s 2009 new zealand book of verse, beautiful daughters of men: novella in short verse tinakori hill, have appeared in prominent journals including south dakota review, poetry new zealand, jaam (just art movement), earl of seacliffe art workshop, , voyagers: new zealand science fiction poetry anthology. complete poems published in january 2009, in legal studies forum. beautiful daughters tale of 2 migrants new zealand, woman chechnya , dying man.

in 2011, forrester s initial memoir, blaw, hunter, blaw thy horn, published in america. in review, quincy herald-whig described book memoir , historical commentary on lives of parents, harry , rose, , impacted family during stays in various parts of west-central, central, , southern illinois. herald-whig s review observed harry forrester, coach of men s basketball team @ quincy college (now quincy university) 1954 1957, earned respect decision play 5 black players did leading hawks first national tournament appearance. herald-whig s review noted harry forrester did not spend time in quincy, s safe impact remembered forever , recalling landmark coaching decision came @ height of racial insensitivity in mid-to-late 1950s , full decade before texas western (now utep) started 5 black players in ncaa division national championship game. movie made texas western team, outside of quincy, handful of people day realize history first made [by forrester , players] in west-central illinois.

a review of blaw, hunter in effingham daily news observed of memoir takes place in first half of twentieth century in small slice of illinois centered in montgomery , christian counties – in towns raymond, harvel, , morrisonville , forrester s memoir reaches 16th century , melungeon ancestors.

forrester s story kilgore trout moment appeared in legal studies forum in 2010. story whimsical tale of oddball poet contributes baseball writing conference in tennessee, suffering near-death experiences , failures communicate along way, find redemption, @ last, @ home. in 2012, forrester s story tulips featured in legal studies forum.