Nasdijj

He has said this Navajo word means "to become again", according to an 1890s text.

Timothy Patrick Barrus, also known as Tim Barrus (born 1950), is an American author and social worker who is best known for having published three "memoirs" between 2000 and 2004 under the pseudonym Nasdijj, by which he presented himself as a Navajo.

The books were critically acclaimed, and Nasdijj received several literary awards and recognition from major institutions.

His "memoirs" dealt in part with issues of two adopted children who suffered from severe problems.

He attended community college in Largo, Florida and started writing in the early 1970s, although he did not publish anything for years.

At the age of 19, Barrus married Jan Abbott, from a nearby town.

Barrus began publishing articles in the late 1970s, primarily for the gay leather magazine Drummer. After his move to Key West in 1984, he also wrote for The Weekly News, a local gay newspaper.

Together they have a daughter named Kree, born in 1974.

In 1975 they adopted Tommy, a boy who Barrus said had severe developmental problems.

After two years, they turned him back to the state, finding they were unable to care for him adequately.

Barrus and Jan later separated and divorced.

He moved to San Francisco and later Key West.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Barrus had published numerous articles and several novels.

He is credited by Jack Fritscher with coining the term "Leather Lit."

Tim Barrus was born and grew up in Lansing, Michigan, where he attended public schools.

His parents were European American: his father Maynard Barrus worked as a foreman at the power plant.

His mother Jean Anne Steginga was of Scandinavian descent.

He has a younger sister, Suzanne.

Marrying at a young age, Barrus took a variety of jobs and lived in different regions of the country in his early years.

Jack Fritscher (editor in chief) described Barrus as "one of the best editors" the magazine had in the 1980s.

Barrus subsequently worked as an editor at Knights Press, creating the LeatherLit Writers Series.

By his account in later interviews, Barrus moved into social work, serving "special-needs children in Florida, Apache kids in New Mexico, disabled adults in Michigan", and autistic children in San Francisco.

From 1985 to 1992, he published five novels, all dealing with homosexuality in different genres.

While some were favorably reviewed, he never broke into mainstream acceptance.

His novel Genocide was recognized as an early contribution to AIDS literature, described by critic Toby Johnson as "dark and pessimistic".

In connection with Anywhere, Anywhere, a novel about Americans in Vietnam during the war, Barrus said that he had been a Vietnam veteran.

Barrus remarried in 1993, in San Francisco, to a special education teacher named Tina Giovanni.

She has worked with autistic children for 20 years.

Barrus was a "provocative associate editor" of Drummer Magazine for five issues (#117-122).

An editorial by the publishers on his departure explained that they were impressed with the work that he had done, and regretted that "Justice Department persecution of publishers of erotica" had caused him to terminate the relationship.

In 1996, he and his wife Tina moved from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida to a Bureau of Indian Affairs School at Mariano Lake, New Mexico.

This period inspired his persona as Nasdijj.

In 2006, journalists revealed that Barrus had published the Nasdijj books under a fictional identity, and that the events depicted in all three were largely fiction.

In the United States publishing world, Barrus' work is cited as an example of memoirs released under misleading pretenses.

The deception was revealed in the same period as the James Frey scandal.

Controversy arose over the portrayal of fictional accounts as memoirs, as well as authors presenting false personas.

Native Americans strongly criticized Barrus for appropriating the historic suffering of their people.

They criticized the publishing world for so readily accepting impostors.

Irvin Morris, a full-blood Navajo and professor of literature and Navajo studies at Dine College, in 2006 said there was no such word in the language.

"he became again" is, however, násdlį́į́', which Barrus may have misread as Nasdijj.