In the mythical town of Winesburg, Indiana, there lives a cleaning lady who can conjure up the ghost of Billy Sunday, a lascivious holy man with an unusual fetish and a burgeoning flock, a park custodian who collects the scat left by aliens, and a night janitor learning to live with life's mysteries, including the zombies in the cafeteria. Winesburg, Indiana, is a town full of stories of plans made and destroyed, of births and unexpected deaths, of remembered pasts and unexplored presents told to the reader by as interesting a cast of characters as one is likely to find in small town America. Brought to life by a lively group of Indiana writers, Winesburg, Indiana, is a place to discover something of what it means to be alive in our hyperactive century from stories that are deeply human, sometimes melancholy, and often damned funny.

In the rolling hills of southern Indiana, an elderly couple copes with the fear that their river bottom farm the only home they've ever known will be taken from them through an act of eminent domain. The river flowing through their land, where the old man has fished nearly every day of his life, may be dammed to form a reservoir. Their son, meanwhile, sinks deeper into troubles of his own, struggling to determine his place in a new romantic relationship and the duty he owes to his family s legacy. What This River Keeps is a beautiful and heartfelt novel that reflects upon what it means to love a place and a family, and the sometimes staggering cost of that love."