Homecoming Authors
Saturday, Oct. 5 – SJU Bookstore from 10:30 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.
David Charpentier, SJU class of 1989
The Boy Who Promised Me Horses
“He tried to outrun a train,” Theodore Blindwoman told David Joseph Charpentier the night they found out about Maurice Prairie Chief’s death. When Charpentier was a new teacher at St. Labre Indian School in Ashland, Montana, Prairie Chief was the first student he met and the one with whom he formed the closest bonds.
From the shock of moving from a bucolic Minnesota college to teach at a small, remote reservation school in eastern Montana, Charpentier details the complex and emotional challenges of Indigenous education in the United States. Although he intended his teaching tenure at St. Labre to be short, Charpentier’s involvement with the school has extended past thirty years. Unlike many white teachers who came and left the reservation, Charpentier has remained committed to the potentialities of Indigenous education, motivated by the early friendship he formed with Prairie Chief, who taught him lessons far and wide, from dealing with buffalo while riding a horse to coping with student dropouts he would never see again.
Told through episodic experiences, the story takes a journey back in time as Charpentier searches for answers to Prairie Chief’s life. As he sits on top of the sledding hill near the cemetery where Prairie Chief is buried, Charpentier finds solace in the memories of their shared (mis)adventures and their mutual respect, hard won through the challenges of educational and cultural mistrust.
Bryan Fleegel, SJU Class of 2007
“Jack and the Caterpillar” is a story about a little boy, Jack, playing in the backyard when he meets a giant caterpillar named Catty. Catty and Jack become fast friends. But Catty is sad because it’s almost time for him to change into a butterfly and he can’t seem to find a tree big enough to hold his large cocoon. Jack and Catty set out together in search of a tree just the right size for Jack’s big bug friend, and along the way they learn about being brave, helping friends and trusting others. This is a story about friendship, adventure and helping others, highlighting the importance of supporting friends and trusting each other.
It emphasizes the rewards of kindness and bravery, and teaches us to make a difference in someone’s life, no matter how big or small we are.
Steve Hoffman, SJU class of 1989
A Season for That: Lost and Found in the Other Southern France
Steve is a Minnesota tax preparer and food writer, as well as a French speaker and shameless Francophile. His writing has won multiple awards, including the 2019 James Beard M.F.K. Fisher Distinguished Writing Award. He has been published in Food & Wine, The Washington Post, The Minneapolis Star Tribune, and Artful Living magazine. His first book, A Season for That: Lost and Found in the Other Southern France, is the story of his family’s gradual (then precipitous) acceptance into a tiny Languedoc winemaking village, of his bottom up education in Mediterranean food and wine, and of a hard-won self-acceptance in mid-life. Hoffman shares one acre on Turtle Lake, in Shoreview, Minnesota, with his wife, Mary Jo, their elderly and entitled puggle, roughly 80,000 honeybees, and a nesting pair of sandhill cranes who summer in the backyard.
Barbara Rudnicki, CSB class of 1964.
Conversations with a Loving God: Judy’s Cancer Story
Conversations With a Loving God is an intimate look into a woman’s battle with cancer and how she found peace and comfort through her faith. Through journals and Bible verses, we witness the reassurance of God’s word during her cancer journey. The story takes us back to the 1980s, a different time both medically and spiritually. However, it is remarkably current, resonating with our struggles, sense of isolation, fears, and need for reassurance when we are in doubt. As Judy would say, “My story of a loving God is needed today more than ever.”
In 1981, Judy Garrity was diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer. When she heard the prognosis of ‘two months to live, ‘ she brought her plea for a long life to her God, who promised her more time. Throughout her journey with cancer, she continued to bring her fears and pain to her loving God in the form of journals. In reading Bible verses, she had what she called “conversations with a loving God.” This always brought her a sense of peace, and she was given several more years of life. After a year of being cancer-free, she discovered she had lung cancer. She died in 1984.
On July 4th, 2021, through serendipity, Judy’s college friend, Barbara, learned that Gwen, her daughter’s best friend, was Judy’s daughter. To add to her initial astonishment, she discovered that Gwen still kept Judy’s journals. Barbara felt Judy calling her to bring her unfinished vision to life. After a year of translating Judy’s journals, Barbara compiled them into book form adding her commentary and memories from Judy’s children.