Drowning in Fire

Description

Josh Henneha has always been a traveler| drowning in dreams| burning with desires.
As a young boy growing up within the Muskogee Creek Nation in rural Oklahoma| Josh experiences a yearning for something he cannot tame.
Quiet and skinny and shy| he feels out of place| at once inflamed and ashamed by his attraction to other boys.
Driven by a need to understand himself and his history| Josh struggles to reconcile the conflicting voices he hears–from the messages of sin and scorn of the non-Indian Christian churches his parents attend in order to assimilate| to the powerful stories of his older Creek relatives| which have been the center of his upbringing| memory| and ongoing experience.
In his fevered and passionate dreams| Josh catches a glimpse of something that makes the Muskogee Creek world come alive.
Lifted by his great-aunt Lucille’s tales of her own wild girlhood| Josh learns to fly back through time| to relive his people’s history| and uncover a hidden legacy of triumphs and betrayals| ceremonies and secrets he can forge into a new sense of himself.
When as a man| Josh rediscovers the boyhood friend who first stirred his desires| he realizes a transcendent love that helps take him even deeper into the Creek world he has explored all along in his imagination.
Interweaving past and present| history and story| explicit realism and dreamlike visions| Craig Womack’s “Drowning in Fire” explores a young man’s journey to understand his cultural and sexual identity within a framework drawn from the community of his origins.
A groundbreaking and provocative coming-of-age story| “Drowning in Fire” is a vividly realized novel by an impressive literary talent.