Art of the Sextant
Laurel Ferejohn
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A small island, a misbegotten marriage, an émigré psychiatrist fond of hypnosis: this is the terrain Valetta navigates with tranquilizers and subterfuge in 1969. At barely nineteen, her reluctant existence in a circle of Marines and wives is shadowed by war on the horizon and in her own bed. She escapes in secret rendezvous with Tomby—a gay Marine with a bitter attachment to Elvis and a risky connection to an off-limits mentor—while he and his enemies, including Valetta’s husband, wait for orders to Vietnam. In their final frantic days on the island Valetta and Tomby attempt a mutual rescue even as their separate maelstroms pull them far from each other.
.___________________________ . This project is made possible by an Ella Fountain Pratt Emerging Artist Grant from the Durham Arts Council with support from the North Carolina Arts Council, a division of the Department of Cultural Resources..
Ferejohn is the winner of the 2012 Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize from the North Carolina Writers Network. Her winning short story, “That Other Story,” is forthcoming in the Thomas Wolfe Review.