SOLACE and PERSPECTIVE Thomas Mira Y Lopez | Daniel Olivas Profiles, Interviews, Reviews New Books November 13, 2017 | $5 | Vol
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
SPECIAL ISSUE High Country ForN people whoews care about the West SOLACE AND PERSPECTIVE Thomas Mira y Lopez | Daniel Olivas Profiles, interviews, reviews New books November 13, 2017 | $5 | Vol. 49 No. 19 | www.hcn.org 19 49 No. | $5 Vol. 2017 13, November CONTENTS High Country News EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR/PUBLISHER Paul Larmer EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Brian Calvert FEATURES SENIOR EDITOR Jodi Peterson ART DIRECTOR 14 Cindy Wehling The Rock Shop DEPUTY EDITOR, DIGITAL A house of relics in search of a self Kate Schimel Essay by Thomas Mira y Lopez ASSOCIATE EDITORS Tay Wiles, Maya L. Kapoor ASSISTANT EDITORS 19 The Great Wall Paige Blankenbuehler, Short story by Daniel Olivas Anna V. Smith D.C. CORRESPONDENT Elizabeth Shogren 20 WRITERS ON THE RANGE What Are We EDITOR Betsy Marston Fighting For? ASSOCIATE PHOTO EDITOR Essay by Brooke Larsen, Brooke Warren COPY EDITOR winner of the 2017 Bell Prize Diane Sylvain A prehistoric megalodon shark tooth at Tucson Mineral and Gem World. COURTNEY TALAK CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Tristan Ahtone, Graham Brewer, Cally Carswell, Sarah Gilman, Ruxandra INSIDE DEPARTMENTS Guidi, Michelle Nijhuis, Jonathan Thompson 4 3 FROM OUR CORRESPONDENTS The weaponized landscape On the border with author Francisco Cantú Krista Langlois, Sarah 5 Indie presses in the West — a sampling WEBSITE: Tory, Joshua Zaffos HCN.ORG EDITORIAL FELLOwS 6 A map of language Esther Belin is trying to shape a Navajo way of writing Emily Benson, 7 A Kumeyaay poet merges natural and personal history 11 THE HCN Rebecca Worby Native restoration DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR 8 Rewriting the West What happens to our view of wilderness when the ones telling the stories are women? COMMUNITY Laurie Milford 10 New books for fall reading Research Fund, PHILO ANTHR PY ADVISOR Dear Friends Alyssa Pinkerton 28 Book reviews DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANT Christine List Belle Turnbull: On the Life and Work of an American Master Edited by David J. Rothman and 21 BOOKS MARKETING & PROMOTIONS Jeffrey R. Villines Reviewed by Greg Hobbs MARKETPLACE MANAGER JoAnn Kalenak Quakeland: On the Road to America’s Next Devastating Earthquake by Kathryn Miles Reviewed by Ben Goldfarb EVENTS & BUSINESS PARTNER 32 MARKETPLACE COORDINATOR Laura Dixon Gather the Daughters by Jennie Melamed and Red Clocks by Leni Zumas Reviewed by Michael Berry WEB DEVELOPER 40 HEARD Eric Strebel Upstream: Searching for Wild Salmon, From River to Table by Langdon Cook Reviewed by Nick Neely DaTABASE/IT ADMINISTRATOR AROUND Alan Wells 35 Wild reading How bringing books into the backcountry deepens the experience Essay by Leath Tonino THE WEST DIRECTOR OF ENGAGEMENT Gretchen King 38 Thoughts on the end Essay by Ana Maria Spagna and Laura Pritchett By Betsy Marston ACCOUNTANT Erica Howard ACCOUNTS RECEIVABLE Jan Hoffman Contributors CUSTOMER SERVICE MANAGER Christie Cantrell CUSTOMER SERVICE Kathy Martinez (Circ. Systems Administrator), Pam Peters, Doris Teel, Tammy York GRANTWRITER Janet Reasoner [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] Michael Berry Ben Goldfarb Heather Greg Hobbs, Thomas Mira Nick Neely is Daniel A. Olivas Laura Pritchett Eric Siegel Ana Maria [email protected] is a Berkeley, is a former Hansman lives a former Justice y Lopez’s work the author of is the author of is the author of recently finished a Spagna is the [email protected] California-based HCN intern in Seattle. She’s of the Colorado has appeared Coast Range: A nine books, includ- seven books, most season working as author most currently writing a Supreme Court, in The Georgia Collection from ing this year’s The recently Making a field naturalist recently of The FOUNDER Tom Bell freelancer who and frequent has written contributor who is book about water co-directs DU Review, Kenyon the Pacific Edge. King of Lighting Friends with in Colorado’s Elk Luckiest Scar on BOARD OF DIRECTORS about books at work on his first management and Law School’s Review Online, The His most recent Fixtures: Stories. Death: A Field Mountains. He is Earth, a novel John Belkin, Colo. and authors for book, Beaverland the Green River. Environment and Normal School and story for HCN He has written Guide to Your a poet and writer about a young Beth Conover, Colo. the Los Angeles (Chelsea Green Follow @hhans- Natural Resources other publications. was about a for publications Impending Last based in Denver; snowboarder and Jay Dean, Calif. Review of Books, Publishing, 2018). man Program. His He’s the 2017- newly recognized including The New Breath. Her work this is his first her activist father. Bob Fulkerson, Nev. San Francisco published poetry 2018 Kenan species of bird in York Times, Los has received the piece for HCN. Follow Wayne Hare, Colo. Visiting Writer at Idaho, the Cassia PEN USA Award, @amspagna Laura Helmuth, Md. Chronicle, Sierra books include Angeles Review John Heyneman, Wyo. Magazine and Colorado, Mother the University of crossbill. Follow of Books and Los the Milkweed Osvel Hinojosa, Mexico other publications. of Rivers: Water North Carolina at @nsneely Angeles Times. National Fiction Samaria Jaffe, Calif. Follow @mlberry Poems. Chapel Hill. Follow @olivasdan Prize and more. Nicole Lampe, Ore. Follow @TMiYL laurapritchett.com Marla Painter, N.M. Bryan Pollard, Ark. Raynelle Rino, Calif. High Country News is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) independent 81428. Periodicals, postage paid at Paonia, CO, and other post Estee Rivera Murdock, D.C. offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to High Country News, Dan Stonington, Wash. media organization that covers the issues that define the H American West. Its mission is to inform and inspire people Box 1090, Paonia, CO 81428. All rights to publication of articles Rick Tallman, Colo. igh in this issue are reserved. See hcn.org for submission guidelines. Luis Torres, N.M. to act on behalf of the region’s diverse natural and human Country communities. (ISSN/0191/5657) is published bi-weekly, 22 Subscriptions to HCN are $37 a year, $47 for institutions: Andy Wiessner, Colo. times a year, by High Country News, 119 Grand Ave., Paonia, CO 800-905-1155 | hcn.org Florence Williams, D.C. News Printed on recycled paper. 2 High Country News November 13, 2017 From our wEBSITE: HCN.ORG A national park fee hike Editor’s note would deter visitors At 17 “highly visited” national parks, the Trump administration has proposed increasing entrance Finding perspective, seeking solace fees up to $70 a car during peak periods. This proposal would generate $70 million annually, Wildfires. Hurricanes. Mass center in Arizona, and a Tucson rock shop which would barely dent the National Park Service’s shootings. Political threats full of oddities, which prompts him to deferred maintenance backlog of $12 billion. It also against all we hold dear. consider, “What is the right way to treat the erodes equity for visitors. G LENN NELSON/CROSSCUT In times like these, we relics that do not belong to you, but in some MORE: hcne.ws/unequal-access seek perspective where way define you?”L os Angeles writer Daniel we can find it, trying to Olivas tackles a different sort of hallowed make sense of all that’s ground: In a short story that turned out to happening. Me, I’ve been be uncomfortably prescient, he imagines taking long walks on the public lands near families forcibly separated by a great wall HCN’s hometown, Paonia, Colorado. On a between the U.S. and Mexico. crystalline October day, I hiked the dusty Author profiles, Q&As and book reviews trails of Mount Jumbo through sagebrush round out the issue, introducing Francisco and juniper. A ridged chunk of sandstone Cantú, a former Border Patrol agent turned caught my eye: a fossilized clam, about the author, and Tommy Pico, a queer Native size of a 50-cent piece. John McPhee’s Basin American whose poetry juxtaposes his and Range came to mind: “If geologic time childhood on California’s Viejas Reservation The Roosevelt Arch, at the North Entrance to could somehow be seen in the perspective with his current life in New York City. Yellowstone National Park, is inscribed: “For the Benefit and Enjoyment of the People.” of human time … sea level would be rising Another Native poet and artist, Esther Belin, YUNNER, CC VIA WIKIPEDIA and falling hundreds of feet, ice would grapples with how English verse can reflect come pouring over continents and as quickly Navajo existence. Writers Blair Braverman You say go away … continents would crawl like and Emily Ruskovich discuss women writers CHAD YOUNG: “This is a strategy to get citizens amoebae, rivers would arrive and disappear challenging traditional visions of the West. disinterested in national parks and public lands by like rainstreaks down an umbrella. …” It was Essayist Leath Tonino and a handful of creating barriers to accessibility. Their ultimate goal oddly comforting to picture the travails of other writers consider “wild reading” and is handing over public lands to states and by default today as just a ripple in a vast stretch of how the books we read in the backcountry to the wealthy.” time, and to imagine these clay hills again can provide solace, distraction and a deeper BRIAN HENCH: “Some parks such as Zion and submerged beneath a shallow sea. experience. And finally, Laura Pritchett and Yosemite have serious overcrowding problems. Putting limits on visitors is a very unpalatable way This special issue of HCN might offer Ana Maria Spagna ponder a question for of dealing with it. This approach may be a lesser evil a bit of perspective as well: It’s our annual these sometimes dark and uncertain times: that gets infrastructure fixed.” break from covering the news of the West, If we knew we would die today, what would S TEVEN ARGUS MCQUINN: “It is designed to get a look at the region through a different we most want? Faced with that question, I’d people mad enough to insist that Congress vote to lens, that of literature.