Every town has stories beneath its streets.
Some are buried beneath abandoned mines.
Others beneath baseball fields, family tables, and memories that refuse to disappear.
Bespoke is where I share those stories.
Featured Book
Seven Hills
A novel by Brent Taylor
In the fictional mining town of Jasper, Oklahoma, three childhood friends come of age beneath the shadow of the Seven Hills—towering remnants of a mining boom that brought prosperity to their community while leaving scars that will outlast them all.
Grace Ryan, Percy Walker, and Clay Boyd share a childhood shaped by baseball, friendship, faith, and the rhythms of small-town life. But as they grow older, Jasper begins to change. The mines that once sustained the town have left behind poisoned streams, buried dangers, and questions few people are willing to ask.
When Grace returns home from college, she sees Jasper differently. Her hometown seems to be changing. Percy dreams of becoming a writer and searches for a life beyond Jasper. Clay is deeply faithful to his home and family.
As their paths diverge, each must decide what loyalty means to a hometown that has given them both belonging and loss.
Seven Hills is a story of friendship, memory, courage, and the complicated love we carry for the places that made us.
Books for Sale
Seven Hills will be Available to purchase October 2026
Stories
-
My good friend Ralph Rowand once told me something in college that made me look at him with a tilted head like a dog that’s been given kale. “Our generation got cheated out of a war.” said Ralph bemusedly. Once my head leveled back, I understood him to mean that the cheated part was the glory,…
-
He can tell a story better than Mark Twain on a riverboat drinking whiskey in the moonlight, although the surreal and the absurd are difficult to distinguish from reality. I hang near him at family gatherings, because I’m a writer and he gives me stuff you can’t make up. And like Seinfeld’s blonde girlfriend who…
-
I told everyone that I would not cry and I did not. But that was my brave face in front of friends and family. It was a long walk down the aisle, about 100 yards from the garden to the wedding tree. Lauren and I chatted as we strolled toward our family and friends, but…
-
If the opposite of love is apathy, then the least one can do in a marriage is care enough to occasionally say, “I hate you.” I never really learned how to constructively argue until the 10th year of our marriage, (I actually yelled at Karen) which was a revelation to me, not that confrontation is…
-
Here are some pictures from our two day Chicago trip. The Chicago River Architectural Tour was right up my alley. It’s hard to believe much of Chicago burned to the ground in 1871, and that the fire was so hot, it jumped the river in a sort of fire induced tornadic fireball. But that event, gave rise…
-
I married into a family of seven Toms. My father-in-law, two brothers-in-law, two nephews, one son of a nephew, and a husband of a cousin, all named Tom. It’s fitting then, that my daughter will soon marry Thomas Beck Martin. Toms are ubiquitous in our family so it seems strange to me that a $2…
-
Some pictures and commentary from our road trip to New York. Encountered a wandering imp named David in Springfield, MO who eagerly joined in our roadside yoga in a lovely shaded park near the zoo. We enjoyed the first of daily pauses, listening to our designated poet, assigned joke teller, daily homily giver and quote maker.Enjoying Sunday…
-
Dear Aunt Shirley: Aunt Shirley on the far left I wanted to come see you today, because you are one of my favorites, not just a favorite Aunt, one of my favorite people. We are traveling today, so instead of coming to see you, knowing how I like to talk, it might tax your energy…
-
“Where will we be in thirty years,” Was not on my mind As I stood waiting, Starched and bright eyed Watching your loveliness From the front of a church Looking down the aisle To you And your Dad, Thomas Walking proudly On legs stiffened by scars and burning hard work His joy holding on to…
