Tamara R. Bower

I taught written and oral communications at a technical college for five years. I now write novel-length fiction.The work I am submitting to agents now is Lake Random. Lake Random is a coming-of-age novel set in a crossroads town halfway between Chicago and Madison, Wisconsin. Lake Random follows three friends of different cultural backgrounds through their final year of high school. The friends have formed a tight bond since grade school that has seen them through life's storms: two are people of color; two live on the edge of poverty; one is the target of bullying and none of them have a mother. They're aware of their differences but are confident in their friendship and dreams until the dark secret of a woman they don't know and a physical assault of someone they know all too well begins to fray and tear at them because of a tragedy and its aftermath. Lake Random challenges faith, relationships, r**e culture and gender norms.