AMERICAN AVENUE: Rhythm & Reason

American Avenue will make you laugh and cry, but perhaps most of all, think. You'll find the warmth of Ivan Doig, the coloration of Annie Proulx, the cadence of Timothy Egan and the philosophical undertones of Ayn Rand and Tom Robbins. It is a collage of the American condition at the beginning of the 21st century. Short stories, poems, longer stories, rants and essays-sketches and analyses that reveal the complexity and diversity that give America its resilience and hope. As Mr. Steding writes, "Americans are both grotesque and lovely, producing a conundrum so grand as to be insoluble by either allies or enemies." The final essay, The Future of American Power: A Manifesto for Change should be mandatory reading for anyone in a position of national leadership, today.

William Steding grew up in Seattle, spent many summers of his youth in South Dakota and enjoyed a career that took him to the boardrooms of New York and back rooms of Washington DC. He resides on his ranch in North Texas and with greater frequency, on the western slope of Colorado.