In "The Clay Remembers", Sharon K. Miller introduced us not only to Anna, an archaeologist fleeing her abusive husband, but also to the world her sensitive touch uncovers. Through shards of ancient pottery, we catch glimpses of nineteenth-century homesteaders and even of native Americans a millennium before them.

Now, in ''The Clay Endures", we learn what drove Esperanza and Armando to stake a claim on the lonely ridge where Anna will turn up her pot. Esperanza's struggle to survive in an all-but-barren place becomes ever grimmer. There are threats on all sides, some to be faced without the husband whose obsession has brought them here. Yet she is never quite alone: Sharon Miller is convinced of the solidarity of women throughout time, and the pot connecting all three women in this trilogy-to-be is the symbol of the love, work, and suffering which binds them in shared experience.

It's only right to acknowledge that Sharon Miller is my editor. However, I challenge anyone to read episodes such as Esperanza's removal of a bullet from Armando, her facing down of intruders, her giving birth in a desolation, and not be struck by the power of these passages.

And not only that: shining out in this novel is an evident love of the Arizona landscape and the creatures that inhabit it. The momentary flashes of a still deeper past, in which the pot comes into being, suggest that the third volume in the "Clay" series will be well worth waiting for. ( )