Darling of the Blackrock Desert: Three novellas set in the West
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A01=Laura Newman
Author_Laura Newman
birds
California
Category=FBA
Category=FS
Catholicism
desert
eq_bestseller
eq_fiction
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_modern-contemporary
eq_new_release
eq_nobargain
fires
Great Los Angeles Library Fire
hitchhiking
Las Vegas
Los Angeles
Mojave
Nevada
nuns
oasis
Religion
San Francisco
Product details
- ISBN 9781953002815
- Publication Date: 30 Apr 2026
- Publisher: Delphinium Books, Inc
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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From the critically acclaimed short fiction writer Laura Newman, whose first collection of stories, PW effused “with candor and wry wit, and memorable details, these stories shimmer,” come three, thematically-liked, quirky yet resonant novellas that together form an unusual and original view of western American life.
In The Darling of the Black Rock Desert, Julia loves Howi, but never intends to marry him until she realizes she’s pregnant with few options; it is, after all, 1960. Life becomes more complicated and yet richer when their darling daughter, Nia, is born with a physical disability. Despite her infirmity, Nia manages to have a fairly normal, happy childhood, beloved by her best friend Wynona and their male sidekicks until tragedy strikes and family life comes undone.
It’s 1986 in City of Angels when Henri and Simone Bouchard meet in the iconic Los Angeles Central Library. Simone is a college art student, and Lenny is a Viet Nam vet trying to survive extreme PTSD. They strike up an unlikely acquaintance that is interrupted when the great Los Angeles Library fire of 1986 happens, a substantial portion of the books—and their tenuous connection—going up in flames. Will they find one another again?
It's 2006 in The Saints of Death ValleyT, a nun in a San Francisco convent adopts a baby left on the doorstep and in order to raise her must leave the faith. Named Grace, the baby grows up; however, after committing what she fears to be an unforgivable sin, Grace takes her bag of holy cards and hits the road, winding up at the Burning Man Festival and then in Death Valley where she is taken in by a family of pastry chefs and landscapers and tries to reinvent herself in a secular world.
In The Darling of the Black Rock Desert, Julia loves Howi, but never intends to marry him until she realizes she’s pregnant with few options; it is, after all, 1960. Life becomes more complicated and yet richer when their darling daughter, Nia, is born with a physical disability. Despite her infirmity, Nia manages to have a fairly normal, happy childhood, beloved by her best friend Wynona and their male sidekicks until tragedy strikes and family life comes undone.
It’s 1986 in City of Angels when Henri and Simone Bouchard meet in the iconic Los Angeles Central Library. Simone is a college art student, and Lenny is a Viet Nam vet trying to survive extreme PTSD. They strike up an unlikely acquaintance that is interrupted when the great Los Angeles Library fire of 1986 happens, a substantial portion of the books—and their tenuous connection—going up in flames. Will they find one another again?
It's 2006 in The Saints of Death ValleyT, a nun in a San Francisco convent adopts a baby left on the doorstep and in order to raise her must leave the faith. Named Grace, the baby grows up; however, after committing what she fears to be an unforgivable sin, Grace takes her bag of holy cards and hits the road, winding up at the Burning Man Festival and then in Death Valley where she is taken in by a family of pastry chefs and landscapers and tries to reinvent herself in a secular world.
Newman’s trio of novellas about desert misfits are by turns probing, incandescent, and like her shorter fiction, riotously funny and are certain to broaden her readership.
Laura Newman is the author of the short story collection The Franklin Avenue Rookery for Wayward Babies. Her stories have been printed in The Saturday Evening Post, Literary Hub, Failbetter, Apricity Magazine, New Plains Review, and the Reno News & Review. Newman is the 2024 recipient of the University of Nevada Libraries Nevada Writer’s Silver Pen Award.
