Tommy Washbush
An outline of the state of Wisconsin with local book covers inside.
From thrillers to memoirs, several books published in 2023 placed Madison in starring and supporting roles. Among them are I Know What You Did, a psychological thriller set within a psychological thriller by Madison author Cayce Osborne.
The plot of I Know What You Did (Crooked Lane) revolves around a bestselling novel that fictionalizes the death of Petal Woznewski’s best friend when they were freshmen in high school — and accuses Petal of the murder. Petal, intent on identifying the pseudonymous author, revisits the dark secret she spent decades trying to forget while desperately parsing fact from fiction. West High School, the Madison School Forest and the Spring Harbor neighborhood are just a few of the locales in which Osborne sets her smart and sassy debut.
The capital city also appears in Ann Garvin’s Midwesterner-in-Hollywood romp, There’s No Coming Back From This (Lake Union Publishing), and Michelle Wildgen’s Wine People (Zibby Books), about two independent women who open a wine distributorship in Madison.
Outside of the Mad City, don’t forget Michael Perry’s vulnerable Forty Acres Deep (Sneezing Cow Publishing), an elegiac novella about a Wisconsin farmer grieving his wife’s death.
Dry Land (University of Wisconsin Press), by B. Pladek, is set in Wisconsin’s north woods during World War I. Pladek, an associate professor of English at Marquette University, immersed himself in research to write this historical novel. It focuses on several queer characters — including Rand Brandt, a man with a magic touch who can grow any plant within minutes.
A Winter’s Rime (Forge Books), by Carol Dunbar is another novel set in rural Wisconsin with gay characters. It’s a story of emotional survival revolving around two women that explores the impact of generational trauma and the promise of second chances. Dunbar writes from the second floor of a water tower in the northern Wisconsin woods.
Set in 1971, Willa’s Pursuit (Bower House), by James Bastian, follows a University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate student who immerses herself in a sensory deprivation tank for a routine psychological experiment and emerges with the ability to not only speak fluent French — a paranormal phenomenon known as xenoglossia — but also in possession of someone else’s memories. The tale was inspired by real events. Bastian is a former high school history and psychology teacher living in Brookfield.
Wisconsin proved to be fertile ground for nonfiction writers this year, too. Survival Food: North Woods Stories by a Menominee Cook (Wisconsin Historical Society Press), a food memoir by Thomas Pecore Weso, is stuffed with coming-of-age tales set on a reservation in the 1980s and 1990s. Weso focuses on the foods that influenced his youth. Weso was born on Wisconsin’s Menominee Indian Reservation, lived and worked in Madison for more than 15 years, and died in California mere months before the book was published.
Paper Valley: The Fight for the Fox River Cleanup (Wayne State University Press), by P. David Allen II and Susan Campbell, tells the story of a $1 billion David-vs.-Goliath legal battle against corporate paper company polluters and their allies that took place throughout the 1990s. Bonus: The book is printed on recycled paper.
Balaraman Kalyanaraman’s entertaining memoir Bombay to Brew City: Reflections of a Cheesehead from India (Ten|16 Press), chronicles the personal and professional journey of the former chair of the Department of Biophysics at the Medical College of Wisconsin. He came from a small town in India to the American South and finally to Milwaukee, where he was a pioneer in cancer and Parkinson’s disease research.
The Magic Hour: A Very Personal History of State Street (Little Creek Press), by former Puzzlebox and Little Luxuries owner Janice Durand, follows the cultural and economic evolution of State Street from the late 1960s to the early 2020s, as well as her family’s University Heights neighborhood. Boldly nostalgic and insightful, deeply candid and intimate, and immensely absorbing, her memoir reminds readers about what makes Madison so special.
Two independent presses aimed at helping writers and aspiring publishing professionals also celebrated a big year in 2023.
Cornerstone Press, a publishing house and teaching press at the UW-Stevens Point, is one of only five undergraduate, student-staffed presses in the United States. Cornerstone publishes 30 to 35 short story, creative nonfiction and poetry collections each year, including many by Wisconsin writers. Sometimes Creek by Steve Fox, won a Best Book Award for short fiction from the American Book Fest in November, and Finding the Bones by Nikki Kallio was a Best Book Award finalist. Other Cornerstone Press titles by Wisconsin writers published this year include Hoist House by Jenny Robertson and The Effects of Urban Renewal on Mid-Century America by Jeff Esterholm.
Meanwhile, the burgeoning Wisconsin Writers Association Press published its second title in 2023, Red Road Redemption: Country Tales from the Heart of Wisconsin, a collection of “life-based fiction” by writer and documentarian Pamela J.A. Fullerton. It follows the press’ debut title, Gravedigger’s Daughter: Growing Up Rural, by Debra R. King, released in late 2022. According to the association (of which this writer is a member), “the WWA Press exists specifically for writers who tell Wisconsin-themed stories.”
More Wisconsin-centric books published in 2023:
• Brush: A Novel (Independent), by Penn Anderson
• Cold: The Unsolved Murders of Seven Young Women (CK Books), by Kevin Damask
• First to the Front: The Untold Story of Dickey Chapelle, Trailblazing Female War Correspondent (St. Martin’s Press), by Lorissa Rinehart
• Frank Lloyd Wright’s Wisconsin: How America’s Most Famous Architect Found Inspiration in His Home State (Globe Pequot), by Kristine Hansen
• Growing Old Sucks: Minne-Sconsin Stories (Henschel Haus Publishing), by Rick A. Wehler
• The Heir: A Novel (Dorrance Publishing Co.), by Aaron Qualio
• Legacy on Ice: Blake Geoffrion and the Fastest Game on Earth (University of Wisconsin Press), by Sam Jefferies
• Never Givin’ Up: The Life and Music of Al Jarreau (Wisconsin Historical Society Press), by Kurt Dietrich
• Opening Day in Milwaukee: The Brewers’ Season Starters, 1970-2022 (McFarland), by Matthew J. Prigge
• Owner of a Lonely Heart: A Memoir (Scribner), by Beth Nguyen
• Serving Herself: The Life and Times of Althea Gibson (Oxford University Press), by Ashley Brown.
Several Wisconsin authors also published the next title in their mystery/thriller series this year. Many of them are set somewhere in the state and include:
• Bought the Farm: An Abe & Duff Mystery (Spilled Ink Press), by Sean Patrick Little
• The Devil Particle/The Vessel: Books 1 and 2 of The Devil Particle Series (Independent), by Kristin A. Oakley
• Driftless Desperation: A Jim Higgins Driftless Mystery (Little Creek Press), by Sue Berg
• Musky Run: A Northern Lakes Mystery (Feet Wet Writing), by Jeff Nania
• The Killer Speech: A Cole Huebsch Novel (Level Best Books), by Kevin Kluesner
