UMKC Law Review

Short Fiction: “Truck Stop” Now Available

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here is my short story (available in final form at BEPRESS), published in the UMKC Law Review as part of their Law Stories series, with the following abstract:

Every American Indian person — repeat, every American Indian person — is related to or knows someone or is someone who has been adopted out of or removed from their reservation family. A significant percentage of each recent generation of American Indian people has grown up among strangers, either adopted by non-reservation families or force-fed through a state foster care system. This is, of course, one of the fundamental issues Congress hoped to address when it enacted the Indian Child Welfare Act in 1978. This fictional narrative is my take on what it means for an Indian person to lose their family — and to regain it much, much later.

Law Stories Series: “Truck Stop”

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

My contribution to the UMKC Law Review‘s “Law Stories” series — “Truck Stop” — is available for download on SSRN. Here is the description:

Every American Indian person – repeat, every American Indian person – is related to or knows someone or is someone who has been adopted out of or removed from their reservation family. A significant percentage of each recent generation of American Indian people has grown up among strangers, either adopted by non-reservation families or force-fed through a state foster care system. This is, of course, one of the fundamental issues Congress hoped to address when it enacted the Indian Child Welfare Act in 1978. This fictional narrative is my take on what it means for an Indian person to lose their family – and to regain it much, much later.