Valerie Nieman

At the dawn of the second millennium, two royal Scottish children are swept away from their families—Macbeth to the perilous royal court of his grandfather, and Gruach to the remnants of the goddess-worshiping Picts. Macbeth learns that blood bonds are easily severed while Gruach finds her path only to lose it when she’s summoned back to the patriarchal world. Each struggle with gaining and losing power, guided and misguided by prophecy and politics as their paths converge in a fiery bid for royal succession. Upon the Corner of the Moon separates literary legend from reality, immersing readers in a story about the real rulers who changed the face of Scotland. Some legends are true, and the truth sometimes becomes a legend—or a lie. This novel masterfully dovetails the Macbeth legend and the truth without sacrificing either.

Darrick MacBrehon, a government auditor, wakes among the dead. Bloodied and disoriented from a gaping head wound, the man who staggers out of the mine crack in Redbird, West Virginia, is much more powerful—and dangerous—than the one thrown in. An orphan with an unknown past, he must now figure out how to have a future.Hard-as-nails Lourana Taylor works as a sweepstakes operator and spends her time searching for any clues that might lead to Dreama, her missing daughter. Could this stranger’s tale of a pit of bones be connected? With help from disgraced deputy Marco DeLucca and Zadie Person, a local journalist investigating an acid mine spill, Darrick and Lourana push against everyone who tries to block the truth. Along the way, the bonds of love and friendship are tested, and bodies pile up on both sides.In a town where the river flows orange and the founding—and controlling—family is rumored to “strip a man to the bones,” the conspiracy that bleeds Redbird runs as deep as the coal veins that feed it.

Leopard Lady: A Life in Verse by Valerie Nieman tells the story of Dinah, an orphan child of Appalachia who runs away to a carnival, and the emotional, physical, and spiritual journey she embraces. Born in the depths of the Depression, the biracial child is "given" to the childless Gastons to raise. She eventually finds her way out of exploitation into a life on the road as a carnival hootchie-kootchie dancer and fortune-teller. Self-educated with the King James Bible and a volume of Shakespeare, her voice blends Elizabethan phrasings with Appalachian and carnival speech. When Dinah is afflicted with vitiligo, she adds a turn as a "freak" called the Leopard Lady as the show travels back roads from the Carolinas to Pennsylvania. A dropout from divinity school joins the show, and they begin a debate over the nature of God and man-each seeking an understanding of their place in the universe-that becomes a close friendship.

Fidelities is the first collection of eighteen short stories to be published by this multi-faceted author. The stories in Fidelities, which are mostly set in West Virginia, are both heartrending and beautiful. Nieman published her first novel, Neena Gathering, a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel, in 1988. She has also published two poetry chapbooks, Slipping out of Old Eve and How We Live. Her second fictional work, Survivors, was published in 2000.