Joel Spring

Dreams and Despair in the Midnight Sun Joel Spring

Will Quinn succeed in his Alaskan get-rich schemes? Will Alice ever be able to leave him? What fates await Red, his lovers, and his Anchorage artists' and environmentalists' collective? How does Ginger flee life as an illiterate prostitute in Ketchikan to become the first woman to own and operate her own salmon trolling boat and to flourish as a renowned nature artist? How do rising tensions between local environmentalists and encroaching logging, mining, and tourism corporations play out?Adventure and emotional drama, peppered with flashes of humor, propel this saga of fishermen, prospectors, prostitutes, gay lovers, environmentalists and murder set in Southeastern Alaska from the 1920s to 1980s. Sons of an itinerant snake-oil salesman and bare-knuckle boxer who finagles a position as Crow Reservation doctor, brothers Quinn and Red Kennedy are born and raised on the Reservation in the late-19th century. In the 1920s they set out to seek their fortune in Alaska. Their dreams, schemes and conflicts, their friends and lovers, the places they call home over the years come fully alive in this richly detailed, psychologically complex story spanning early scenes of 19th century medicine wagons and life on the Crow Reservation to, later, trolling for salmon in Alaska, prospecting for gold, barroom brawls, flashpoint social and environmental issues of the times, daily routines and struggles in Alaskan towns and wilderness, and island life in Sitka, Alaska.