Works by
Tim Gautreaux
(Writer)

As Editor

• Louisiana Literature: A Review of Literature and Humanities Fall 1989 (1989)

• Louisiana Literature Spring 1989 (1989)

Fiction

• The Clearing: A Novel (2004)
  In the years before World War I, Byron Aldridge led a charmed life as the charismatic heir apparent to a Pennsylvania timber empire; and to his younger brother, Randolph, he was both guide and idol. But he returned from France a different man and was not home long before those festering memories sent him drifting from one settlement to another, working as a lawman, and then disappearing altogether.
  
  Finally his family discovers him in a remote Louisiana mill town, promptly buys the property, and puts Randolph in charge of this place unlike any he has ever seen, where men are surrounded by cypress swamps and menace, leading lives of ceaseless, backbreaking toil punctuated only by the brutal entertainments provided by the Sicilians who control the whiskey and card games and girls, and by the rough justice meted out by the still-tormented Byron. Randolph struggles to understand him, and to regain his trust, even as their wives presently contend with their own hopes and disappointments and while the future grows uncertain yet fearsome all around them.
  
  This is a story about family, about marriage, about what sustains people through loss; it is a reckoning of the sacrifices they must make in order to establish a community in the deepest wilderness, and to defend what is most precious to them. Palpably atmospheric, with a remarkable range of characters and emotions, The Clearing displays more powerfully than ever before Tim Gateaux's masterful understanding of time, place, and human nature.

• The Next Step in the Dance: A Novel (1999)
  Paul Thibodeaux is an handsome young man married to Colette, the most beautiful woman in the small Louisiana town where they grew up. For Paul, life is complete: a wife he loves, machines to repair, and a lively local dance hall. But Colette wants more, and when she sets off for California in search of a better life, Paul follows her there and back, waiting to see if she'll change her mind about him. In the meantime, the oil bust of the '80's has destroyed their hometown, and Paul and Colette must salvage not only their marriage but their livelihoods. How they do this, and come to realize the importance of family, home, and marriage, makes for a novel that is at once an adventure, a love story, and moving portrait of a place and a culture rarely explored in contemporary fiction.
  
  Tim Gautreaux writes with wit, compassion, and a sharp eye for the details that make us who we are, where we are. His first novel is the triumphant confirmation of the talent so widely acclaimed in Same Place, Same Things: Stories.

• Welding with Children: Stories (1999)
  Tim Gautreaux returns to the form that won him his first fans, with tales of family, sin, and redemption: from a man who realizes his grandchildren are growing up without any sense of right or wrong, and he's to blame; to a camera repairman who uncovers a young woman's secret in the undeveloped film she brings him; to a one-armed hitch-hiker who changes the life of the man who gives her a ride.
  
  Each one a small miracle of storytelling and compassion, these stories are a joyous confirmation of Tim Gautreaux's rare and generous talent.

• Same Place, Same Things: Stories (1996)
  In this collection of stories, Tim Gautreaux chronicles the lives of "ordinary" people who face extraordinary circumstances and decisions: a farmer faced with the prospect of raising his infant granddaughter; a young man who falls in love with a voice on the radio; a train engineer who causes a colossal disaster. In stories filled with heart and humor, event and consequence, the customs and culture of Louisiana come to life in the hands of a writer who blends rare talent with an even more unusual humanity.