In Berkeley's Green and Pleasant Land: Stories

Berkeley, California in the 50's, 60's and 70's. The innocent dream, the disquieting experience, the banner of failure. In the title story, a graduate student, as yet unaware of her failing marriage, is attracted to a charming, sad alcoholic, a classic Berkeley failure. In the participant, a housewife, anxious to avoid the trauma of eventlessness, seeks out experience. In at 1 he had been a leader . . . , a wife views with horror her husband's libidinous transformation. In two women, two close friends discover their growing estrangement. In make haste, my beloved, a woman throws herself into the night, desperate and hoping. In lies, a woman hones her skills to become an inauthentic self. In streamings, a female develops her sexuality only to realize it was "one more unusable talent". In death to the fascist-imperialist dogs, a woman rages at heterosexual privilege. In notes from the tower of menopause, a frenetic woman reviews her life choices. In this picnic you're having, the hunger for love is used up on the children. In these sad and tender stories, Berkeley is itself a main protagonist. The characters, previously unacknowledged in the official narrative of Berkeley, take center stage in the dreamscape called Berkeley