Jim Stegner

Jim Stegner is the narrator from whose point of view the entire story is told. He is a big bearded man, age 45, with salt and pepper hair and scarred hands. He is a fairly famous, successful painter, with two books written about him, his style characterized as "Great American Southwest Post-Expressionist Naif." Stegner lives in western Colorado, but has previously lived in California and New Mexico. His primary avocation is fishing, which obsesses him more than his painting. He has been sober for almost three years. Stegner grew up in California, where his logger father died in an accident on the job. His mother died a few years later in a drunk driving accident. He has been twice-divorced and enters into a relationship with Sofia during the course of the novel. His daughter was murdered when she was fifteen.

Some years before the novel begins, Jim shot...