Welcome

Many thanks for stopping by. You find me anticipating the birth of my second book, Stony River, but still proud as ever of first child Silent Girl. She was born of my passion for all that women are and strive for. She provided the embryo and energy for the longer Stony River, a novel. Feel free to poke around and check out the discussion guides for Silent Girl. You’ll find one for each of the eight stories in the collection and a page from which you can download each and all. Feel free, as well, to engage me in conversation on Silent Girl Speaks or elsewhere, using the comments feature. It can be lonely in here.
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Shakespeare Revisited

Silent Girl takes us into the remarkable lives of fictional daughters, sisters, friends, lovers, wives and mothers through a story collection inspired by Shakespeare’s plays. Set in Canada, Kyrgyzstan, Thailand and the United States, eight insightful stories deal with a range of contemporary issues: racism, social isolation, sexual slavery, kidnapping, violence, family dynamics and the fluid boundaries of gender. (Published by Inanna, 2008)

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Long-listed for the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award and the George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature.

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You can listen to me read from Silent Girl here.

Destination:
Stony River

It wasn’t all poodle skirts and rock and roll. The novel Stony River explores the lives of three girls coming of age in small-town New Jersey, 1955-1962. It just might challenge your assumptions about right and wrong, sanity and madness, love and abuse.  Watch for it from Penguin Group (Canada), August 2012.
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Praise for Silent Girl .

Dower’s fluid imagination is masterfully captured in the flawless technique of her prose.

— Nicole Langen,
Tribute Books

Dower’s characters are richly realized — exceedingly reflexive, teeming with desire and impulse.

— Lisa Foad,
Herizons Magazine

Read all reviews here.