The Odyssey of Izzy

Izzy O’Hara, a loveable misfit, as wily, hapless and tender as Moll Flanders, suffers a nervous tic that's twice misdiagnosed as S.A.D. When she thinks she sees her estranged brother Tommy on her smoke break in downtown San Francisco, she embarks on an odyssey that takes her into her past, the history of American punk rock, and across the American West. She’s not sure if it was Tommy, who ran off with a rockabilly band in the Eighties, or was it Ray Z. Omaha of the Twelve Steppers, the singer he mimicked? Is it her vision and everybody looks like somebody else, or is she just S.A.D.? Then those pesky calls from the Governor begin. Time to move to another big city. In Chicago, her luck is double-edged: She is still being followed, yet she herself follows Ray Z. Omaha and his band to solve the mystery of Tommy. But one too many rough nights find her on the run again, this time back home to Nebraska, where she thinks she begins to see things more clearly. She follows Ray’s band on tour westward, retrieving clues from her troubled past, tracing the roots of American punk all the way to Hermosa Beach and East L.A, while falling for the bass player Dirk. While Izzy is on her odyssey, her mother dies suddenly. The loss of this sweet, steady figure devastates her. Ray flies in for the funeral and promises he will find Tommy. Izzy returns to San Francisco where Ray has another surprise, but it’s the good kind—not, “Hi, I’m a Rockabilly Vampire.” Her vision holds the key to their survival. The character Ray Z. Omaha is based on the life of Charlie Burton of Lincoln, Nebraska, and 10 of Charlie Burton and The Twelve Steppers' songs are included.

A native of Nebraska in the United States, Eva Murray taught English to refugee and immigrant populations in Peshawar, Pakistan; and in Phoenix, Chicago, Salt Lake City, and Omaha in the U.S. before turning to writing. “Low Res,” the first chapter of The Odyssey of Izzy, was a finalist in Barrelhouse Magazine’s “Office Life” short fiction contest in 2009. Her story, "Freelancing in the Land of Gentry" appeared in Tryst in 2009; “Cualquiera,” in The Rambler, 2005; and “Warm Hands,” Grub Street, 1995. She has also published articles about such artists as B.B. King, Stephane Grappelli, Etta James, Bobby McFerrin, Buckwheat Zydeco, the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and the fine artist Kent Bellows. In 2006, she spoke on public radio station KALW-X in the San Francisco Bay Area about the renters’ lifestyle and her non-fiction work, We Rent: In San Francisco. Her feature-length script, Under the Burqa, was a quarter-finalist in Chicago’s Cinestory competition in 1999; and her story “Come Get Your Elk,” a semi-finalist in the William Faulkner/ Pirate’s Alley Fiction Competition in 1994. Eva Murray lives in California and graduated from Sarah Lawrence College.