Dana Furgerson

"I've always been a writer," says Dana Furgerson, who was editor of her high school's literary journal in suburban Lombard, Illinois. She was an English major for two years at Northern Illinois, then eloped, ran off to Phoenix, and gave birth to her son Keith Moses, who is now an art teacher in Corvallis. Divorced after five years, she finished an education degree at Arizona State, married Cecil Furgerson and moved to Halfway, Oregon, in 1978, for a job as a special ed teacher. "I taught for more than 30 years," says Furgerson, who stayed on in Halfway for 13 years (10 more than Cecil) before moving to western Oregon. She taught special ed in several area towns, and in Springfield and Eugene schools, until 2002, and later worked with troubled kids in Looking Glass programs until she retired last November. Wherever she has lived, Furgerson has continued to write and to join with other writers in critique groups. "I've written five novels," she says. "This one, Three Boys Living, is the first I've published. Each chapter takes the point of view of one of the boys, who interact in a remedial history class." Furgerson has also self-published Life Without Fiction, a collection of stories. Both books can be found at Amazon.com and at Tsunami Books in Eugene, where Furgerson will deliver a reading at 4pm on July 29. Joining her in the photo is her furry friend Hank.