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“Cardboard Kingdom,” selected for Youth One Book, One Denver 2019

Provided by Denver Arts & Venues

The 2019 Youth One Book, One Denver summer-reading program selection is from first-time author Chad Sell.

A graphic novel with an imaginative, do-it-yourself theme has been chosen as the 2019 Youth One Book, One Denver winner, Mayor Michael Hancock announced Thursday morning.

“Cardboard Kingdom,” by Chicago-based author and artist Chad Sell, will be available for free to children aged 9 to 12 who participate in Youth One Book One Denver (YOBOD), running June through August.

The summer reading program aims to “combat learning loss through events and activities tied to the book’s themes, ” according to a Denver Arts & Venues news release.

There’s no need to formally sign kids up for the program. All parents need to do is check out the book from a Denver Public Library branch and download the activity guide from artsandvenues.com/YOBOD.

Several free public events tied to the book will also be available for kids this summer, Arts & Venues said, and additional copies of the book — the city purchased 3,000 of them — will be distributed through Boys & Girls Club of America and Denver Parks and Recreation summer programs, said Amber Fochi, program manager for Arts & Culture’s marketing arm.

“(The program) really brings books and reading to life in the minds of our children, and because of it, students gain a life-long love for reading as they participate in the book-related events and activities,” Hancock said in a statement. “Chad’s wonderful graphic novel is especially appealing because it combines the visual and written art to provide a whole new literary experience for every child who will pick it up and dive into its pages.”

The pick for the program’s eighth year — and its first-ever graphic novel — takes inspiration from both the maker movement and the world of comics with activity-based stories told in bold lines and splashes of color. “Cardboard Kingdom” traces the summers of 16 diverse kids “as they transform ordinary boxes into colorful costumes and set out on adventures encountering knights, robots and superheroes in their cardboard kingdom,” Arts & Venues said.

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“I never could have imagined that it would be selected for something like the Youth One Book, One Denver program, where thousands of kids throughout an entire city would read these stories and share in the summer-long activities,” author Sell said in a statement, following a Thursday morning event at College View School with Hancock, City Councilman Jolon Clark and others.

Sell will stick around this weekend for the Denver Indie Comics & Arts Expo, which will be held April 13-14 at McNichols Building in downtown’s Civic Center park.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/04/11/youth-one-book-one-denver-cardboard-kingdom/

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What about a blobfish? Colorado author Jason Gruhl believes small humans can think big.

The children’s book “Everything Is Connected” doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to blobfish. They’re slimy, stinky, scaly and about as loathsome as an animal might get.

And yet, as the book points out, they just happen to be our cosmic cousins, sharing our universe — our water, air and resources — alongside our brothers and sisters, our pets, parents, trees, the sky and even other planets. Understanding the scheme of all things is just a matter of looking around, taking stock, seeing your own place among all the atoms that surround you.

Can kids do that?

Author Jason Gruhl thinks so. So does his publisher, Boulder-based — and Buddhism-inspired — Shambhala, which sells books the world over by such deep thinkers as the Dalai Lama, Matthieu Ricard and Pema Chödrön. “Everything Is Connected” is the debut offering from its new imprint, Bala Kids, the 50-year-old company’s first official move into the children’s market.

Mindfulness might seem like a big concept for young readers, especially the ones who can’t yet see the big-picture benefits of eating their vegetables or pushing pause on video games to do their homework. But “we feel like children can get adult stuff,” said Ivan Bercholz, who heads up the family-owned publishing house with his sister, Sara Bercholz. Shambhala books are distributed through Penguin Random House.

“Everything Is Connected,” which is illustrated by Barcelona artist Ignasi Font, gives children a logical path to junior enlightenment. It starts out small by reminding kids of their own physicality, linking them to their “hands and eyeballs, teeth and toes,” then moves them outward to things like “buildings and bicycles, buses and balloons,” then eventually into outer space.

The journey isn’t limited to the world that can be seen and touched. There are connections to the past and to the future and to spirituality, to “Jesus and Buddha, Muhammad and Moses,” and, because nearly everything rhymes in the book, to “spaceships and aliens with noses like hoses.”

Noses like hoses? I asked Gruhl, who is also a veteran family therapist and educational consultant, to explain how his ideas came together.

Note: This interview has been edited for length, cohesiveness and clarity.

RJ Sangosti, The Denver Post

Denver author Jason Gruhl, center, reads his new book, “Everything Is Connected” at the Tattered Cover on Colfax on April 2, 2019 in Denver. Gruhl’s book was published by Shambala books out of Boulder.

Q. I sometimes think kids, like dogs, in a way, are only aware of “the now.” This asks them to think bigger, no?

A. Ha! I hate to admit that I often compare the two, but I also aspire to be more like kids and dogs, so hopefully that takes the edge off that comparison.

I think it’s true. And it’s beautiful. As adults, we get conditioned by our parents, schools, society, religions, etc., and we forget to check in with our own experience, to be in the moment, and to let that guide us. Kids — and dogs — do this effortlessly until we condition it out of kids.

Q. Who did you write this book for?

A. In general, I always write for kids between the ages of seven and nine  — third grade-ish. This is the time when their minds are starting to explode with questions, observations and insights, but most of them are still willing to give their parents a hug.

Q. Still, this is a big concept for young minds.

A. It is a big concept but I actually think it’s a more difficult concept for adult minds. Understanding connection on this level actually requires you to settle into your intuition. Kids have a natural and organic relationship to intuition that I think allows them to see and feel the possibility of what this book is proposing more easily.

Q. Why rhyme?

A. You know, people have a love-hate relationship with rhyme. You can’t even use rhyme these days without someone comparing you to Dr. Seuss. But rhyme is a really timeless and engaging format. I think it sticks in people’s minds — I want people to remember what’s being said. I like the challenge of it as a writer, and I think when you break rhyme in a rhyming book, it can really be a powerful moment for the reader to take in what’s going on.

Q. What is your personal framework that helped you write this book?

A. I’m trying to help kids, and adults, remember their wholeness, and feel at home in their own skin. It’s not just a catchy phrase — our bodies, minds and spirits really are connected and how well we attend to each of these in ourselves has an effect on the rest of the world. In my past work with children with autism and developmental disabilities, it became really obvious that health, mental challenge, social and personal fulfillment and compassion — being accepted and celebrated for exactly who we are — were critical for growth and for new ways of moving forward.

Q. What kind of kid is this book good for?

A. Life hands us a lot of curveballs, from birth to death, and there are times in our lives when we are not able to hear something that we could easily hear later. So while I think this concept is something that helps everyone in some way or another, I think this book is for any kid who feels isolated or alone at times. It’s for kids with scientific minds who want to begin to contemplate the “how” of connection. And it’s for kids who have a really open and soft heart. I’ve always had one of those, and I think this book gives you somewhere to direct that.

Q. What do you hope it will do for kids?

A. The last thing this world needs is one more prescription for how things should be done. I hope the book gets kids thinking about how everything is connected, and what that would actually mean if they are. And from there, that there are a million unique ways of being in this world, and that whatever they’ve got to contribute is something we need.

Q. Is it hard to write a book for young readers?

A. The ideas are never hard. I often imagine the world I want to be living in, or things that I wish I had known sooner, and then just go to work writing something that would be engaging and fun to read. I have a lot of respect for children and I also try to speak to them from a place of intelligence. Kids can handle way more than we give them credit for, and we have to trust them enough to speak clearly and candidly with them.

Q. Did it take long to write?

A. Almost three years to the day from my first word on the page to publishing date. It started in Chattanooga, Tennessee,  while I was meditating with an incredible group of women out there. But it really became what it is after a class and critique group at Lighthouse Writers here in Denver. I worked on it a lot while traveling as well, so it was fine-tuned in Barcelona and Morocco, and finally polished by my patient editor, Juree Sondker.

Q. How did you hook up with Ignasi Font? He lives in Barcelona.

A. Instagram is the most powerful digital platform we have today for connecting with creatives. Countless artists post their talent, vision and passion. I found Ignasi there, invited him to collaborate, and the next thing I knew we were on our way.

Q. Anything to add?

A. To be Shambhala Publications’ (Bala Kids) first children’s book after 50 years of sharing and creating some of the legends of spiritual texts is a massive honor, and to have Shambhala Publications right here in our own backyard is a gift. As a Colorado author, it is exciting to be part of this groundbreaking, independent publishing house. Colorado truly is on the forefront of preserving and evolving the history of what we read and how we use it to understand ourselves and others, and to change the world.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/04/09/jason-gruhl-childrens-book/

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Harry Potter-themed dining with the Great Hall and all apparating to Denver this summer

Denver witches and wizards, accio smelling salts because you are about to pass out upon learning of a Harry Potter-themed brunch apparating to Denver this summer.

The event, called The Wizard’s Brunch, will feature a themed three-course meal, a potions lesson, fortune tellers and house points, according to a release sent this morning. It would be in the event’s best interest to also have a Hogwarts-esque hospital wing because heart may not handle the excitement.

Video from Canadian renditions of the experience show guests walking into what can only be an experience similar to the Great Hall with candles and owl cages suspended from the ceiling, house robes, wands galore and plenty of food. There are also many photo opportunities to capture it all.

Two sittings will be available: a family-friendly brunch for all the first-years and their parents, and an adults-only dinner for some more magical shenanigans.

Make sure your spell-binding antics don’t land you on the front page of the The Daily Prophet come morning.

Tickets for the event will be going on sale next month, said event spokesman James Harrison. Muggles need not apply, but anyone else can sign up at thewizardsbrunch.com.

Harrison said the event would likely take place in June, but he didn’t disclose a location. They must be trying to locate the Room of Requirement in the meantime.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/02/26/harry-potter-themed-wizard-dining-denver/

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Book review: Heller’s “The River” is a fiery tour de force

Fiction The River By Peter Heller (Knopf)

There is a line in Peter Heller’s newest book, “The River,” that one could use to explain it.

On the page, it’s referring to the northern lights, but it’s also a perfect description of the captivating and poetic thriller: “It was terrifying and unutterably beautiful.”

Jack and Wynn are college buddies, men whose friendship has been forged by their mutual love of books and the outdoors. They’re on a long canoeing trip in northern Canada that unexpectedly takes a turn into part mystery (a man, likely in shock, whose wife has gone missing in the woods) and part action-adventure (there’s a giant, hellish forest fire burning behind them).

“The River” is Heller’s fourth work of fiction, and it recalls his debut, “The Dog Stars,” with its poetic, staccato sentences and masterfully crafted prose. Not to mention a Colorado connection — Heller lives in Denver. “The Dog Stars” was set along the Front Range, and, here, Jack grows up on a ranch outside of Granby, learning survival and toughness in the rugged Colorado landscapes.

The story itself resembles a trip down a river — some parts are peaceful and allow for quiet introspection and big, deep breaths. But then you hit the rapids and the danger and risk jump off the page, forcing a sense of urgency.

In those thrilling parts, reading required self-discipline. I wanted to know what happened so badly that I’d read too fast and had to retrace my steps to savor Heller’s storytelling.

And what a story he tells. On the technical side, it’s brimming with authenticity and there was more than enough gear talk. (I have never been in a canoe. I have seen “Deliverance,” and that’s close enough, but I didn’t get lost in jargon.) Heller is an experienced outdoorsman and whitewater kayaker, (so, of course he lives in Colorado), and it shows here.

The wilderness is more a character than a setting, and Heller captures its duality. The serenity of drifting down a calm river at night: “They loved how the darkness amplified the sounds — the gulp of the dipping paddles, the knock of the wood shaft against the gunwale. The long desolate cry of a loon.” And the sheer terror of a wildfire baring down: “The burning debris rained down, they swiped it off arms, shoulders … an inconstant blizzard of sparks, bunches of pine needles flaming like flares, birch leaves ignited to molten lace rained down, but the wind had gone quiet, it eddied as if confused, circled around them like a dog settling for sleep … .”

With Heller’s background, the fully developed main characters are entirely credible. Jack is cautious and watchful, his childhood shadowed by a tragedy, and Wynn is a Vermont kid who believes in the goodness of people. But they are both just carefree college boys who are largely unprepared for the events that await them on what was supposed to be a trip full of fishing and stargazing.

That includes finding the wife of the man who Jack and Wynn encounter, severely injured and near death, and crossing paths with two drunken rednecks before the wildfire — and the intention of the man the find paddling down the river — forces a fight of survival.

At the heart of the book is the delicate dance of beauty and brutality. And it plays out in the wilderness that Jack and Wynn seek out and in the characters themselves — and in the people they meet.

The wildfire is fearsome and unpredictable, burning one tree down, only to leave another unscathed. So, too, is one man’s violence or another man’s hubris.

I could not put this book down. It truly was terrifying and unutterably beautiful.

Journalism doesn’t grow on trees. Please support The Denver Post. Become a subscriber for only 99 cents for the first month.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/02/21/book-review-the-river-peter-heller/

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Colorado ski patrol history as told by ‘the world’s worst-skiing’ patroller and ‘an accidental ski bum’

One calls himself “the world’s worst-skiing ski patroller.” That’s Eric Miller, who lives in Colorado Springs when he’s not traveling as a flight nurse, a member of the Air National Guard.

The other, John Cameron of Salida, calls himself “an accidental ski bum.” He, like Miller, never saw himself becoming the first responder he is today on Monarch Mountain’s slopes.

Yet it is this unlikely pair delivering a new book on Colorado’s niche profession. “Ski Patrol in Colorado” enters Arcadia Publishing’s lexicon of local and regional history, the next addition to the series called Images of Modern America.

“Is it the true, comprehensive history of Colorado ski patrol? No,” says Miller, downplaying himself again. “But the pictures are fascinating, and there are definitely deep roots of history in the pages.”

He doesn’t claim a deep connection to patrol, nor does Cameron — each with 10 years under their belts, more or less. But both felt called to the tribute. For them, the book was a way to honor their duty — the men and women who are “ambassadors of the mountain lifestyle,” as they write in the introduction — while also finding their place in a tradition as old as World War II.

A few of the photos are Cameron’s own. There’s a fellow patroller plowing through a powdery stash, “enjoy(ing) the perks of the trade,” reads the caption. Perhaps that’s the image that comes to the mind of the casual skier.

“Yes, there’s a lot of skiing in ski patrol,” Cameron says. “But there’s a lot of other work that goes into it.”

Cameron also captures a team member rappelling from a chairlift, a training exercise in the case of a malfunction. Another shows a patroller measuring water content in snowpack, a daily task in the effort to monitor avalanche risk. Many more show a crew of red jackets surrounding guests in stretchers.

Cameron also reveals a ritual among patrollers at Monarch Mountain. In their shack of an outpost, the team is gathered around the Wheel of Misfortune as one spins to determine what he will owe the others in beer — a glimpse into the camaraderie born by partners who count on each other for their lives, a subculture like no other.

“There is a mystique about it,” Miller says.

It was two years ago in the shack that he and Cameron hatched the idea for the book. Any dedicated skier in the world knew about skiing in Colorado, Miller figured. But what did they know about the people in those red jackets, other than the part about being paid to ski?

It was an easy pitch to Arcadia, Miller says. “Best skiing in the world and the top three or four coolest jobs in the world. It’s a winner all day long.”

He too includes photos from his own brief history on the job. That’s him on the scene of a Black Hawk crash in 2009 near Monarch Mountain, after a blizzard brought down the chopper from Fort Carson. Prepared for something ugly, Miller was relieved to find the three soldiers unharmed.

But most of the photos reach further back in time. They come from several museums and ski areas, though Miller and Cameron found many more by sifting through private collections, Polaroids kept in dusty drawers and shoe boxes.

The first pages are dedicated to the Army’s 10th Mountain Division. Any ski bum-turned-buff knows the story by now: A specialized warfare unit was stationed at Camp Hale near Leadville, assigned to train in the wintry mountains for missions in northern Italy. Those ranks of skiers went on to establish resorts we know today. And the man who recruited them, Charles “Minnie” Dole, established the National Ski Patrol.

Miller and Cameron show the ways of early times — makeshift splints and sheet metal that brought the injured down before toboggans were popularized. The changes in practice are seen with every turn of the page.

But what hasn’t changed, the book creators learned, is the spirit of patrollers, the type of people drawn to the mountain.

Miller and Cameron are perfect examples, wanderlust and benevolence at their core.

As a boy in Indiana, Miller wanted to be a fire truck. “I hadn’t quite realized I couldn’t grow up to be a fire truck,” he says. “However, here I am, 52 years old, and if I hear a siren, I’ll walk to the window and stare. Same thing with helicopters.”

He started his medical training at Colorado State University in Pueblo and went on to be a flight nurse, a career that took him to four continents and five countries last year. Ski patrol felt similarly adventurous.

Cameron was also out for adventure when he came to Monarch Mountain. Freshly graduated from college in Texas, he embarked on the Colorado Trail, skirting the ski area and feeling inspired to work there. He later felt inspired by the patrol, the few and the proud.

But since the book’s release, he’s been surprised by the sheer number of people who have introduced themselves, patrollers of past generations recalling life on the mountain.

“They’ve got all these great memories and stories,” Cameron says.

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from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/02/05/colorado-ski-patrol-history-as-told-by-the-worlds-worst-skiing-patroller-and-an-accidental-ski-bum/

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Unpublished J.D. Salinger work to be released

NEW YORK — One of the book world’s greatest mysteries is finally ending: J.D. Salinger’s son says previously unpublished work by his late father will be coming out.

In comments that appeared Friday in The Guardian, Matt Salinger confirmed longstanding reports that the author of “The Catcher in the Rye” had continued to write decades after he stopped publishing books. He said that he and Salinger’s widow, Colleen, are “going as fast as we freaking can” to prepare the material for release.

“He wanted me to pull it together, and because of the scope of the job, he knew it would take a long time,” Salinger said of his father, who died in 2010 and had not published work since the mid-1960s.

“This was somebody who was writing for 50 years without publishing, so that’s a lot of material. So there’s not a reluctance or a protectiveness: When it’s ready, we’re going to share it,” he said.

Salinger, who helps oversee his father’s literary estate, says any new work might be years away and did not cite any specific titles or plots. He did indicate that the Glass family made famous in such fiction as “Franny and Zooey” would be seen again.

“I feel the pressure to get this done, more than he did,” he said, adding that the unseen work “will definitely disappoint people that he wouldn’t care about, but for real readers . I think it will be tremendously well received by those people and they will be affected in the way every reader hopes to be affected when they open a book. Not changed, necessarily, but something rubs off that can lead to change.”

Longtime Salinger publisher Little, Brown and Company had no comment Friday.

J.D. Salinger published just four books in his lifetime: “Nine Stories,” ”The Catcher in the Rye,” ”Franny and Zooey” and a volume with the two novellas “Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction.” The last work to come out in his lifetime was the story “Hapworth 16, 1924,” which appeared in The New Yorker in 1965.

Salinger rarely spoke to the media and not only stopped releasing new work but rejected any reissues or e-book editions of his published material. This year marks the centennial of his birth and signs of a new openness emerged in 2018 when his estate permitted new covers and a boxed edition of his old fiction to come out for the 100th anniversary. A Salinger exhibit is planned later this year at the New York Public Library, and other promotional events are in the works.

Over the past half-century, rumors and speculation intensified over if any new books existed and if they were of publishable quality. A former lover, Joyce Maynard, and Salinger’s daughter, Margaret, have both contended that the author continued to write books, allegedly stored in a vault in the author’s home in Cornish, New Hampshire.

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A 2013 documentary and book by Shane Salerno and David Shields cited two “independent and separate sources” in predicting five new works. One of the Salinger books would center on “Catcher” protagonist Holden Caulfield and his family. Others would draw on Salinger’s World War II years and his immersion in Eastern religion. Matt Salinger has dismissed the contents of the Salerno-Shields project, but never definitively said that no new work would appear.

Salerno wrote in an email Friday to The Associated Press that “it was always his (J.D. Salinger’s) intention — and specific direction — to have his work published after his death.”

“I’m thrilled that Salinger fans around the world will finally get to see this important work from one of America’s finest writers,” Salerno added. “As the stories roll out over the years, I think you will find that all of our reporting was correct.”

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/02/01/unpublished-j-d-salinger-work-to-be-released/

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His artwork is typically thrown away. Now people raised $590K to put it on their coffee tables.

PARKER — He paints exquisite mountain panoramas rich in detail, with hundreds of tiny trees painstakingly rendered. Then the images that took him weeks to create are printed on cheap paper and distributed by the thousands for free, only to be crumpled up, stuffed in pockets and ultimately thrown away in tatters.

It might seem like a forlorn fate for art so carefully conceived, but the artist doesn’t think so at all.

Colorado Outdoor Voices

This is part of an ongoing series of profiles on Colorado’s outdoor enthusiasts. Check our previous story here:

A running joke: Comedian’s quick rise to elite runner means she’s doing Denver improv one day, leading NYC marathon the next

“That’s the best part of it,” said James Niehues of Parker, America’s foremost ski-trail map artist. “It’s used. Not many artists can say they have a piece of art that’s used like a trail map is. And what’s so nice about it is that they gather around at the end of the day and have a beer, pull out the trail maps and talk about where they’ve been.”

Having been treated as throwaway art for 30 years at ski areas across the country — including such Colorado favorites as Copper Mountain, Breckenridge and Winter Park — Niehues’ work is now being accorded deep respect.

Provided by James Niehues.

James Niehues’ map of Breckenridge Ski Area.

This year his works will be showcased in a coffee table book, and already there is proof of how much it is valued. A crowdfunding effort originally intended to generate $8,000 to test the market and defray some of the publishing costs has raised more than $590,000. It also helped that people who gave larger donations were treated with not only the book but deal-sweeteners such as signed posters.

“It’s just so gratifying to see the response,” said Niehues, 73. “When we hit our goal of $8,000, everybody was elated. Then it hit $20,000, then $50,000, and it just keeps going.”

The working title of the forthcoming book is “James Niehues: The Man Behind the Map,” and it will be published this summer with almost 200 examples of his work, a behind-the-scenes look at how he creates the trial maps, and his own back story.

Defining a genre

The idea for the book came from a fan Niehues had never met.

“I reached out to Jim and said, ‘Hey, I’d love to get a copy of your coffee table book, and if you don’t have one, I’ll help you put one together,’ ” said Todd Bennett, an executive in the entertainment industry who lives in California. “That’s how it started. The fact that he picked me to help him share his story and his legacy is something I do not take lightly. This is a story that will never be told again, where you have one guy who inadvertently cornered the market in a fiercely independent industry.”

The overwhelming response to the Kickstarter campaign is an indication of what his work has meant to skiers across the U.S. for the last three decades. Once described by The New York Times as “Rembrandt of the Ski Trail,” Niehues defines the genre as did two predecessors from Colorado, Hal Shelton and Bill Brown.

“He carried on an art form that was done by those men,” said John Fry, a prominent ski magazine writer and editor who is a member of the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame. “His art really became an integral part of the ski experience for millions of people in the U.S.”

In fact, Niehues got his start in the genre by taking on projects Brown gave him in the late 1980s. The first one was an inset for an area of the Mary Jane trail map that Brown had been hired to do. Brown, who had started as a protege of Shelton, was ready to do something else. Niehues was working as a graphic artist at the time.

Ariel photographs have been a big part of my process.  They are invaluable tools and references to my final art.  Can you guess the mountain with the right @ handle? pic.twitter.com/QrlXqxxlEl

— JamesNiehues (@JamesNiehues) December 19, 2018

“Bill was more interested in shooting narrow-gauge railroad trains and wanted to move on,” Niehues said. “I walked in looking for a job, and I walked out with a career.”

Niehues reckons he has drawn maps for 194 resorts. Because ski areas need new maps when they add terrain, he figures he has painted 350[cq comment=”CQ”] different ski maps, including insets and multiple renderings of the same areas. He says he has painted “four or five” versions of California’s Heavenly Valley, for example, the same for The Canyons in Utah.

But if ski areas aren’t adding trails, there isn’t much need for updated trail maps.

“You can kind of paint yourself out of the market,” Niehues said.

How it started

AAron Ontiveroz, The Denver Post

James Niehues was photographed at his in-home studio on Thursday, Dec. 27, 2018. He began painting ski maps some 30 years ago and has done work for many mountains throughout North and South America as well as for mountains in New Zealand and Australia.

Niehues grew up on farm west of Grand Junction, 12 miles from the Utah border. When he was 13 years old, he was stricken by nephritis (an inflammation of the kidneys) and was bedridden for months. He already had shown an interest in drawing, so his mother bought him a painting set to help him pass the time.

“I laid on the couch painting oils,” Niehues said. “Just copied pictures out of magazines.”

That was in 1959. After high school he briefly attended Colorado Mesa University and then served in the Army from 1965 to 1969, stationed in Berlin. His career in graphic arts began in Grand Junction in 1970, and he moved to Aurora in the mid-1980s. He started painting trail maps in 1987.

Niehues owes a lot to Shelton and Brown, both of whom are deceased.

“Hal was quite a character,” Niehues said. “Just a magnificent painter. He’s better than I will ever be. He had a different style, but certainly a superior painter. As was Bill Brown.”

If Shelton was a role model for Niehues, Brown was a mentor.

“We never talked about the nuts and bolts, but more the psychology of painting,” Niehues said. “He’d tell me, ‘You’ve got to paint these as if you’re down there skiing on them, and the colors that you’re seeing there.’ That has lasted with me.”

Provided by James Niehues

James Niehues painting in the tree shadows on the 2016 Alta map image.

Niehues learned to ski while he was learning how to paint trail maps. One of his first assignments was the Alta ski area in Utah, where he discovered how rudimentary his ski skills really were.

“I’d had enough skiing that I could get down the hill,” Niehues recalled. “I was probably a beginner at that time. We went up and started skiing down. The night before they’d had about 6 inches of snow, and that was really hard for me to handle. I was falling all the time. The instructor jokingly said, ‘You’d think the guy that painted ski maps could ski.’ It took me forever to get down.”

Niehues starts the process of creating a trail map by photographing the mountain from different angles from an airplane. “I have a pilot, of course,” he said. From his aerial photos, he begins the creative process by sketching the mountain in pencil with all the trails and physical features he wants to include. In the pencil sketch, which takes about a week to draw, timber on the slopes is represented by a bunch of squiggly lines.

After the ski area approves the accuracy of his sketch, he uses it as a guide for the painting — usually in watercolors — which will include individually painted trees that are accurately rendered. He doesn’t paint evergreens where there should be aspens, or vice versa. Ski areas take his finished products and add the graphics indicating trail names and lifts.

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Turning three-dimensional space into a two-dimensional artistic representation requires some tricks of the trade. Shadows, for example, help indicate steeper areas.

“It’s very important that we get the shadow right,” Niehues said. “That’s part of tricking the eye into believing that it’s true. You’ve got to keep everything relative. The skier skiing down it doesn’t have the advantage I have of that view. So, as he’s skiing around the mountain looking at this, I have to remember the terrain he’s looking at and what will guide him around.”

Calling himself “just a Colorado farm boy” who became a self-taught artist, Niehues finds it immensely rewarding that people use his art across the U.S. The reception to the book project astonishes him.

“How can you be more gratified?” Niehues said. “You can’t. It’s just phenomenal. What I dreamed would be a good book is proving to be a good book before it’s even printed.”

Journalism isn’t free. Show your support of local news coverage by becoming a subscriber. Your first month is only 99 cents.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/01/19/james-niehues-ski-maps-coffe-table-book/

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Regional books: “Bitterroot,” “Polly Pry” and more

Bitterroot.  By Susan Devan Harness (University of Nebraska)

When she was 2, Susan Devan Harness, a Salish Indian, was adopted by a white couple.  Her birth mother was an alcoholic who didn’t bother to show up at a social services hearing, and so Susan was taken away.  The idea was that she would turn into a white girl with all the advantages of the Anglo society.

It didn’t turn out that way.  Her adoptive father was an abusive alcoholic and bigot who ridiculed Indians.  Her mother was loving but bipolar and unstable.  Harness’ Indian looks made her an outcast in Montana’s often racist society.

Growing up, Harness longed to find her Indian family.  After years of searching, a social worker risked her job to give Harness access to her confidential file. She eventually found her Indian family but discovered she didn’t fit into the Indian world, either.  She lacked knowledge of the culture.  Some Indians called her an apple — red on the outside, white on the inside. While she developed a relationship with some of her family, she nevertheless felt alienated and suffered from depression and a sense of worthlessness.

“Bitterroot” is Harness’ story of her living in two worlds and being fully accepted in neither.  She writes of prejudice — a university adviser who didn’t even look at her educational accomplishments advised her to switch to a vocational school. When she gave the Salish tribe a detailed project she had developed, an elder turned it down because she was white. Only later did the two discover her was her uncle.

Harness, who lives in Fort Collins, became an advocate for Indian adoptees. “Bitterroot,” a moving and emotional memoir, explains why.

Polly Pry: The Woman Who Wrote the West.  By Julia Bricklin (Twodot)

One of America’s best-known “sob sisters,” Polly Pry went to work for The Denver Post in 1898 and quickly became one of the paper’s most popular writers.  She took on causes that stirred readers’ hearts.  Her articles on Alfred Packer, the cannibal, got him released from prison, and she fanned anti-cattle-baron sentiment when she wrote about Wyoming gunman Tom Horn.

She was fervently against organized labor, and her articles about Telluride’s labor unions were so virulent that many Western Slope readers canceled their subscriptions and F.G. Bonfils, the paper’s co-owner, issued a rare apology. Author Julia Bricklin claims that was one of the reasons for Pry’s demise. Gene Fowler, in his history of The Post, “Timberline,” however, maintains Bonfils was uncomfortable with the fact that Pry once saved his life, and that what was led to her leave  the paper.

Pry, whose real name was Leonel Ross Campbell Anthony, then took off on a lengthy foreign tour, writing about her adventures.  Foreign travel was expensive, writes Bricklin, and Pry most likely wrote the articles from home.  After she parted ways with the paper, she set up her own periodical.  It failed, since she was a better reporter than she was a businesswoman.

This concise but nicely researched biography details Pry’s reportorial ventures as well her sometimes scandalous life.

Remembering Lucile.  By Polly E. Bugros McLean (University Press of Colorado)

As Lucile Buchanan waited to receive her diploma as the first African-American to graduate from the University of Colorado, in 1918, she was told that because of her race she would not be allowed on stage. Instead, she would receive her diploma behind the scenes.  She left, vowing never to return to CU, and she never did.

The irony of the white world giving with one hand, then taking with another, was a symbol of Lucile’s life — and that of so many other blacks in the decades following the Civil War.

The granddaughter of a slave and a plantation owner, Lucile was brought up in the Barnum section of Denver in what was then considered an upper-class black family.  Briefly married, she was a teacher and activist, dying at the age of 103. Her life was remarkable but hardly the stuff of a riveting biography.

So author Polly E. Bugros McLean tells Lucile’s story against the backdrop of what life was like for blacks in the 100 years following emancipation. In an exhaustively researched book, McLean writes of the horror of reconstruction and the emergence of the Ku Klux Klan. Denver, she says, was hardly free of prejudice, but whites here were not as fearful of blacks as they were in the South.  That it made it marginally easier for Lucile’s family when they migrated from Virginia to Denver.

McLean intersperses Lucile’s story with details of her far-flung family and commentary on the plight nationwide of post-Civil War blacks.

Lucile’s story may lack excitement, but McLean provides some with an epilogue on two of Lucile’s nieces and their bizarre demise.

Nisei Naysayer.  By James Matsumuto Omura (Stanford University Press)

When the Japanese living on the West Coast were sent to relocation camps during World War II, many took the attitude “it can’t be helped.”  The powerful Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) worked with the government to make the process easier.  But not all Japanese went along with internment.  One protester was newspaperman Jimmie Omura, whose fierce opposition to racism, internment and the JACL lasted a lifetime. “Has the Gestapo come to America?” he asked in an editorial.

Omura, who died 25 years ago in Denver, left behind a memoir that is both informative and bitter. Readers will understand why.

A Nisei, Omura left home at 13.  His father was distant, and his fatally ill mother had taken her younger children to Japan to be raised by relatives. Omura took a variety of menial jobs before becoming a journalist at Japanese newspapers.  With his strident style and hatred for the JA, he made enemies, including Bill Hosokawa, later a Denver Post editor.  He was sued by the government after he opposed drafting internment camp men without giving them full citizenship.  While he was acquitted, he was reviled by many Japanese and gave up reporting. He wound up as a landscaper in Denver.

“Nisei Naysayer” is at times tough slogging, but it is a valuable contribution to the growing body of work on Japanese-Americans during World War II.

Shotguns and Stagecoaches.  By John Boessenecker (Thomas Dunne Books)

Next to cowboys, Wells Fargo detectives might be the most romantic heroes of the Old West.  Plenty has been written about the coaches, but “Shotguns and Stagecoaches” is the first book to concentrate on the men who rode shotgun (a phrase that came much later) — some two dozen of them.

The guards weren’t there to protect the stages, writes historian John Boessenecker. They protected the strong boxes.  Many stages didn’t have guards. They were there only when the coaches carried strong boxes, often a “pony safe,” a cast-iron box bolted to the floor under a passenger seat.

The men who protected the boxes were a brave bunch.  The first “messenger,” as he was known, was Chips Hodgkins, who worked from 1851 to 1891. He and other guards were so successful that not until 1859 did a Wells Fargo sleuth kill a man in a shootout.  Most bandits flagged down the coaches when they slowed down in awkward spots in the road, Boessenecker relates, and few ever chased the coaches. Eventually trains replaced stagecoaches, and both bandits and detectives found new careers with the railroads.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/01/17/regional-books-bitterroot-polly-pry-and-more/

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Tommy Caldwell, who free-climbed El Capitan, opening Winter Words series in Aspen

By Andrew Travers, Aspen Times

After his historic free-climb ascent of the El Capitan’s Dawn Wall in Yosemite National Park in early 2015, Tommy Caldwell stared down a nearly as daunting challenge: a blank page.

To write his memoir, published last year as “The Push,” Caldwell used the same tools he’d used as a climber to revolutionize his sport and accomplish the seemingly impossible.

“With climbing, I’m not super naturally talented physically and I’m kind of in the same boat intellectually,” Caldwell, who will open the Winter Words author series Jan. 8, said in a recent phone interview from his home in Boulder. “I always struggled as a student. But I have this ability to apply pretty incredible discipline and to feel impassioned toward things. That’s what I do with my climbing. That’s what I did with the book.”

Focused on the book for a year, Caldwell set his alarm for 4 a.m. to wake up and start writing no matter how he was feeling or whether he had anything to say. Eventually, “The Push” started taking shape.

Read the rest of the profile on Aspen Times.

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from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2019/01/01/tommy-caldwell-who-free-climbed-el-capitan-opening-winter-words-series-in-aspen/

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Colorado hiker’s unconventional guidebook profiles outdoors women and their favorite trails

Colorado native Heather Balogh Rochfort’s new book “Women Who Hike” is set to publish in the spring of 2019. Here she is hiking Isthmus Peak in New Zealand. (Moxie82, provided by Heather Balogh Rochfort)

Heather Balogh Rochfort’s Instagram feed is filled with jaw-dropping images of Colorado’s mountains and envy-inducing hikes from around the globe.

The 36-year-old Colorado native built her career hiking and writing about the great outdoors with her husband, dogs and more recently her year-old daughter. Now, she’s looking forward to the spring release of her hiking guide, “Women Who Hike.”

But the book won’t be your traditional list of regional trails, maps and recommendations on nearby tourist attractions.

“Women Who Hike” (Falcon Guides) profiles 20 American women in the outdoor industry as well as their favorite hikes. The women run the gamut from professional skier Ingrid Backstrom to Shanti Hodges, a travel writer who founded Hike it Baby, a nonprofit dedicated to getting families with small children out on the trails.

Colorado native Sarah Herron is also included. Herron, who was born without the lower half of one arm, started a company called She Lift, which gets women born with physical disabilities into the outdoors. She was on the reality TV show “The Bachelor” in 2013, and now lives near Aspen.

Rue Mapp, the founder of Outdoor Afro, gets her own chapter in Balogh Rochfort’s book, along with Ambreen Tariq, who started a social media campaign called Brown People Camping to promote diversity in the outdoor community.

We interviewed Balogh Rochfort, who lives in Arvada, about hiking, motherhood and her new book.

(The interview was shortened and edited for clarity.)

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Q: Tell me about the book. What are readers going to get from each chapter?

A: The first half of the book is each woman telling her story and for each of them, it’s going to be different. For some of them, it may be a specific memory they have of a certain trail, or how this trail is representative of who they are as a person or how hiking influenced their careers.

The second half is the more traditional guidebook with directions and GPS coordinates to the trailheads. The hikes are all over the country and range from 1 to 112 miles. It’s certainly a book that doesn’t target one kind of hiker. I  love that because I think its representative of the women in the book, too.

Q: I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a guidebook that also was a series of mini-profiles. How did the idea come about?

A: Maybe a year or two ago, someone from Falcon Guides reached out me and basically gave me an open-ended offer. I knew I wanted to represent women in the outdoor community because I feel like a lot of the representation of women in the outdoors is as a thin, white woman with blond hair bouncing around in her very adorable capris.

My goal is to represent a true spectrum of women in the outdoors. We’re not all the same, and that’s the beauty.

Q: In October 2017, you became a mother. Was your daughter one of your reasons for wanting to write this book? 

A: It wasn’t the intention originally, but it’s definitely, at least mentally, impacted me. I pitched the book long before she was a thought, but it was inspiring to talk to all those women, and it made me wonder what she is going to do in her life. She’s a different generation.

I certainly can’t pretend to be a pioneer or anything, but when I started backpacking, it was just me and the guys. When I tried to buy mountaineering boots back in 2002, no one sold boots specifically for women in the entire city of Boulder. And when you’re five days into a backpacking trip and unexpectedly start your period, it would be nice to have another woman there instead of six guys looking at you wondering what they are going to do to help you.

I think the idea planted itself in my brain back then.

Q: Has becoming a parent changed your relationship to the outdoors?

A: (My husband and I) met later in life, and we held off on kids for awhile. Honestly, we wondered if having a child would prohibit us from living our lives. It’s been nothing but a pleasant surprise.

There’s something so special about introducing her to all of this. We lived with her out of a tent for three months this summer.

It’s not always easy. Lugging two, 10-pound bags of dirty diapers out of the backcountry is not a pleasant experience. But watching her face light up playing with a headlamp for 20 minutes or listening to the birds outside our tent, we’ve rediscovered the joy in those little things.

Q: What advice would you offer to other women and other new moms who want to get outdoors more?

A: The first thing to tell people is to not overthink things.

All those gear guides and magazines can be really overwhelming. Grab a backpack and go out for an hour. It doesn’t have to be an epic adventure.

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter to get outdoor news sent straight to your inbox. 

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/12/30/women-who-hike-heather-balogh-rochfort/

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Regional books: “Continental Divide Trail,” “Bear Ears” and more

“The Continental Divide Trail:  Exploring America’s Ridgeline Trail,” by Barney Scout Mann  (Rizzoli)

What makes America great is not necessarily its constitution nor its entrepreneurial spirit, writes Pulitzer Prize-winning author Nicholas Kristof in his introduction to “The Continental Divide Trail.”  “Another element of American exceptionalism is the beauty and sweep of our public lands.”

That is evident in a selection of Christmas books about the West.

The Continental Divide has intrigued Americans since the pioneers, who saw it — like the Mississippi and Missouri rivers — as a way of separating East from West.

It was not until 1978, however, that Congress designated it as a national scenic trail.  In 2015, photographer Barney Scout Mann hiked the trail, photographing the land, the people, the wildlife and flowers. The result is a spectacular book showing the grandeur and diversity of the Great Divide.

“Bears Ears: Views From a Sacred Land,” by Stephen E. Strom (George F. Thompson Publishing)

At the end of his administration, President Barack Obama designated Bears Ears as a national monument.  Some 1.35 million acres of exceptional wilderness in Utah were protected for future generations. Then, only months later, President Donald Trump, influenced by politicians and developers, reduced the acreage by some 85 percent, to 160,000 acres.

Environmentalists and others were furious, and “Bears Ears:  Views From a Sacred Land” shows why.  The pristine land is a wide swath of desert and mesa, colored in vermilion and peach and gold.  George F. Thompson’s photographs, many of them long and lean like the land itself, show a wild and primitive place.  The lonely landscapes illustrate the pristine nature of the area, with the only evidence of man a few ancient pictographs.  There is a haunting beauty here that development will destroy.

“Visions of the Tallgrass,” photographs by Harvey Payne, essays by James P. Ronda (University of Oklahoma Press)

The central swath of America used to be grassland.  No more.  The prairie was plowed for farms and bulldozed for homes.  Oklahoma’s Tallgrass Prairie Preserve is a reminder of what the Great Plains looked like before the white man came along.

“Visions of the Tallgrass” shows the land primeval in pictures and words.  The vast openness of the preserve gives “a sensation of being lost in space,” writes essayist James P. Ronda. There is not only the land and the wildlife but the sky.  “Day or night the sky can be an open book.”

Harvey Payne’s photographs show both the vastness and the intimacy of the Great Plains, with pictures of lonely prairie as well as buffalo, antelope and red stalks of big-stem grass.

“Cowboys Don’t Do Lunch,” by Herb Cohen (Goff Books)

This book isn’t about the landscape so much as the men who were once players in the landscape. Herb Cohen photographed the aging cowboys around Cave Creek, Ariz., in the last part of the 20th century.  Inspired by the work of Ansel Adams, Cohen captured these Arizona veterans of a bygone era with his camera.

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His black-and-white portraits show grizzled cowboys (and a few Indians), white-bearded and rheumy-eyed, their hands gnarled and liver-spotted.  There are photographs of younger men and some landscapes as wel, but it is the old-timers staring into the camera that capture a long-gone way of life.

“Wild Migrations: Atlas of Wyoming’s Ungulates,” by Matthew J. Kauffman and others (Oregon State University Press)

First of all, ungulates are hoofed mammals: deer, elk, moose, pronghorn, bighorn sheep, bison and mountain goats.  Each spring, they migrate from the Plains to the high country to feed on the rich grasses.  With the arrival of fall, they retrace their steps to their winter range.

The study of such animal journeys is part of an emerging field called “movement ecology,” writes Annie Proulx in a foreword.  So “Wild Migrations” is not just a picture book of Wyoming’s hoofed wildlife.  It is a study of this new field, explained with drawings, graphs, maps and photographs of the ecological importance of ungulate movements.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/12/14/regional-books-continental-divide-trail-bear-ears-and-more/

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Book review: A new hero emerges to save lonely but still determined Harry Bosch

  Give crime writer Michael Connelly credit.

He knows that the career and shelf life of his greatest creation — the laconic but always determined Harry Bosch — is spiraling toward a not-too-pretty end. Now, clearly in his 60s, the ex-Los Angles Police detective has hacked off nearly every boss he’s encountered in his nearly 30-year campaign to right all the wrongs in the City of Angels.

Even his current stint as reserve detective for the tiny San Fernando Police Department may be yanked from under him because of a stupid mistake he makes while investigating an unsolved murder in Connelly’s newest book, “Dark Sacred Night.”

But to revive Bosch’s fledgling drive to deliver a measure of justice in this world, and to jolt some youthful energy into the Bosch series, Connelly introduces Harry to Renée Ballard, who we met for the first time last year in Connelly’s “The Late Show.” Ballard is an LAPD detective who is also an outsider. She lives on the beach with her dog and her only family is a grandmother she sees only occasionally.

Ballard refused the sexual advances of a senior detective, filed a harassment complaint against him, and was banished to the late shift when her colleagues refused to back up her allegations. And like Bosch, she hates it when someone gets away with murder, so aligns herself with Bosch to investigate the cold-case murder of 15-year-old prostitute Daisy Clayton.

The first meeting between Bosch and Ballard is low-key but amusing. Ballard returns to her desk at the Hollywood Division and finds an older man with gray hair and “the mustache that seemed to be standard with cops who came on in the seventies and eighties” rifling through some old records. Ballard readies her Glock to use on Bosch but quickly learns about his quest to find Clayton’s murderer.

Clayton’s body was found in a trash bin in Hollywood nine years earlier. Bosch is so invested in the case, he is letting Daisy’s mom stay with him while she is trying to get off drugs.

Ballard asks her superior if he knows Bosch. “Everybody knows Harry Bosch,” he tells her, solidifying his legend in the LAPD. Ballard decides she could learn something from Bosch, while Bosch recognizes a kindred spirit in Ballard, and the two are quickly off probing the death of Clayton.

But Connelly quickly establishes the Clayton case is not the only one each investigator has to work. The novel goes back and forth between Bosch figuring out who ordered the execution-style slaying of a vicious gang leader while Ballard solves — Sherlock Holmes-style — the death in a house high up on Hollywood Boulevard.

Connelly, as usual, delivers a fast-paced story that doesn’t disappoint. Along the way, Bosch briefly reveals to Ballard how deeply lonely he is while Ballard admits to herself how Bosch reminds her of her long-lost father.

The two also learn they can depend on each other in deadly situations. It’s a relationship that might be built to last.

  from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/12/13/book-review-a-new-hero-emerges-to-save-lonely-but-still-determined-harry-bosch/

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If you want your book signed by Michelle Obama at Denver’s Tattered Cover, get your wristband on Wednesday

So you didn’t get tickets to see Michelle Obama at the Pepsi Center on Thursday.

There’s another chance to see the former first lady in Denver during her national tour to promote her book, “Becoming.”

The Tattered Cover on Tuesday announced it would be hosting Obama at a book signing at 2:30 p.m. Thursday at its Colfax store, before the Pepsi Center appearance moderated by actress Reese Witherspoon.

“Becoming,” which was released on Nov. 13, quickly became the best-selling book of the year, according to its publisher, Penguin Random House. It sold more than 2 million copies in all formats in North America in its first 15 days.

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According to a tweet from the Tattered Cover, a limited number of wristbands will be available for purchase Wednesday at 9 a.m., through an eventbrite link only at $32.50 to $65. The wristbands will not be sold at the store or over the phone.

Attendees will be able to check in starting at noon, and need to be checking in by 3 p.m. There will be no photographs of any kind and no personalization.

Because of the event, the lower level of the Colfax store will be closed Thursday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

For more ticket details, visit tatteredcover.com.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/12/11/if-you-want-your-book-signed-by-michelle-obama-at-denvers-tattered-cover-get-your-wristband-on-wednesday/

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Author Jon Krakauer sues over adaptation of “Into the Wild”

BOULDER — Author Jon Krakauer has filed suit over a musical adaptation of his 1996 book “Into the Wild.”

The Boulder Daily Camera reported Friday Krakauer originally agreed to let playwrights Nikos Tsakalakos and Janet Allard use his name and the book title but changed his mind because he objected to their script.

The lawsuit asks a judge to stop the playwrights from using his name and the title. His attorneys say the agreement allows him to withdraw permission.

The lawsuit was filed Nov. 30 in state court in Boulder, where Krakauer lives.

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The newspaper says the playwrights didn’t respond to requests for comment.

“Into the Wild” recounts Christopher McCandless’ death in the Alaska wilderness. Krakauer’s lawsuit also names the Christopher Johnson McCandless Memorial Foundation, which had also agreed to the adaptation.

___

Information from: Daily Camera, http://www.dailycamera.com/

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/12/08/author-jon-krakauer-into-the-wild-adaptation/

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Things to know about Michelle Obama’s book tour one month ahead of Denver stop

Michelle Obama’s 12-stop jaunt across the country — and an ocean — is not your average book tour. Of course, the former first lady is not your average author.

Oprah Winfrey joined Obama Tuesday night at the United Center, home of the Chicago Bulls and Blackhawks, as she begins the tour touting the already best-selling “Becoming.”

Obama will come to Denver’s Pepsi Center in exactly one month’s time– Dec. 13 — with Reese Witherspoon serving as moderator for the event.

Here’s what to know about the tome and the tour:

WHAT’S IN THE BOOK? “Becoming,” which officially came out Tuesday, describes Obama’s upbringing on Chicago’s South Side, as well as her time at Whitney Young and Princeton University. She writes about straddling economic and social worlds as a child and young adult.

But befitting its title, it takes readers on her journey of becoming a lawyer, wife of former President Barack Obama, mother of two girls, and, ultimately, her eight years in the White House.

Obama shares such deeply personal revelations about racism as well as having a miscarriage. She sharply criticizes President Donald Trump for promoting the false “birther” rumor that her husband was not a U.S. citizen.

Winfrey, who selected “Becoming” for her influential book club , said it’s “everything you wanted to know and so much you didn’t even know you wanted to know.”

As for Trump, Obama writes that his “loud and reckless innuendos” stirred people up and put “my family’s safety at risk.”

“And for this,” she adds, “I’d never forgive him.”

Trump said Obama “got paid a lot of money to write a book and they always insisted you come up with (something) controversial.” The current president said that he’d never forgive his predecessor for making the country “very unsafe.”

HOW IT’S FARING In short, it’s among the most-anticipated political memoirs in years, topping Amazon.com’s best-seller list throughout the weekend. On Monday, Barnes & Noble announced that pre-orders for “Becoming” were the highest for any adult book since Harper Lee’s “Go Set a Watchman,” which came out in 2015. It’s expected to sell millions of copies.

ON THE ROAD Tens of thousands of people purchased tickets to Obama’s United Center appearance — paying from just under $30 to hundreds or even thousands of dollars for VIP packages.

Other stops include Denver, Los Angeles, Washington, Detroit, Boston, Paris and London. The tour ends next month in New York City’s Barclay Center, with Sarah Jessica Parker as moderator.

Although some fans have complained about the high cost, 10 percent of tickets at each event are being donated to local charities, schools and community groups.

THE NEXT CHAPTER Obama’s husband will be next with a memoir, which is expected next year. The couple negotiated a multimillion-dollar deal with Crown Publishing Group. The Obamas have said they will donate a “significant portion” of their author proceeds to charity, including the Obama Foundation.

___

Follow Jeff Karoub on Twitter at https://twitter.com/jeffkaroub and find more of his work at https://apnews.com/search/jeff%20karoub .

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/11/13/things-to-know-about-michelle-obamas-book-tour-one-month-ahead-of-denver-stop/

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Regional Books: “Residue,” “Her Kind of Case” and more

“Residue” by Michael McGarrity (Norton). In a dozen other Michael McGarrity mysteries, Kevin Kerney has solved some tough crimes, often at peril to himself. But nothing has threatened him as much as an unsolved murder in “Residue.”

That’s because Kerney himself is the primary suspect.

Kerney, retired Santa Fe sheriff, is attending a retirement party for his army wife, Sara Brannan, when he’s arrested for a decades-old murder. The body of Kim Ward, Kevin’s college sweetheart, has been found with a bullet hole through her skull. An investigation uncovers damaging information. Among other things, Kerney was the last to see Kim alive, and she was buried with a gun that belonged to Kerney.

What’s more, the investigation is led by Clayton Istee, a cop who Kerney discovered a few books back was a son he didn’t know he had. Clayton’s always blamed Kerney for abandoning his mother, although Kerney had no idea she was pregnant. Instead of recusing himself, Istee plows forward in an attempt to find the truth about the murder.

Forced out of a job for unethical behavior, Istee now joins forces with Kerney and Sara to solve the crime.

“Residue” is a complicated and intriguing mystery that involves an intertwined cast of characters. They include Kim’s mother and husband and a drug enforcement official long thought dead. Of course, the police believe Kerney is guilty and are no help. In fact, they thwart Istee’s investigation.

Like McGarrity’s other books, “Residue” is set in New Mexico, and descriptions of the land and people add to its appeal.

“Her Kind of Case” by Jeanne Winer (Bancroft Press).

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Boulder defense lawyer Lee Isaacs is about to turn 60. She lost her last big case and wonders if time has caught up with her and she’s lost her edge. Maybe she should quit and climb the Himalayas, she thinks.

Then she’s asked to defend Jeremy, a skinhead charged with stomping to death a gay man. Jeremy is young, just 17, and refuses to talk to her. He doesn’t want her help. He’s already confessed, and three of his buddies have pleaded guilty and agreed to testify against him. Isaacs’ gut tells her it’s all but hopeless. This is just her kind of case, and she takes it on.

Set in Boulder, “Her Kind of Case” is a witty, well-crafted novel, a cut above most legal tomes. That’s because the author, Jeanne Winer, is a retired Colorado criminal defense attorney who, like her character, Isaacs, is a martial arts expert. This is Winer’s second novel, and it won’t be her last.

Isaacs is a tough, focused attorney with a sense of humor — the author’s humor, actually — that makes the book a joy to read. The dialogue is crisp and pointed and unbelievably funny at times. The supporting characters — a female investigator on the lookout for a man, a disgraced attorney who acts as Isaacs’ second, and her best friends, a gay couple — give the book diversity.

The story is more serious. Jeremy, it turns out, is a closet gay whose father is a religious bigot. Despite the confession, Jeremy claims he is innocent. Isaacs, who has defended murderers, rapists and clients accused of a variety of heinous crimes, generally doesn’t concern herself over whether they are actually guilty. Jeremy is different, and Isaacs believes in him.

Still, with all that evidence against her client, along with a zealous prosecutor, she knows defending him is a crap shoot. The question is whether she is too old and tired to give Jeremy the defense he needs.

“Lost Lake” by Emily Littlejohn (Minotaur Books).

In the third book in her series about Cedar Valley detective Gemma Monroe, author Emily Littlejohn spins a tale of homicide against a backdrop of legend and ghost tales.

Gemma is sent to Colorado’s Lost Lake, where three campers report a fourth, a young woman named Sari, is missing. Nine of 10 missing persons eventually show up, Gemma tells Sari’s friends. She files the necessary paperwork but puts the case aside when the director of the local historical museum is found dead. Coincidentally, the woman was Sari’s boss. And to complicate things, a rare diary, the jewel of the museum’s collection, has been stolen.

Gemma and her partner, Finn, set out to determine if the three cases are intertwined or merely a coincidence. The two have an uneasy relationship. At the same time she is investigating the murders, Gemma is acting undercover at her chief’s request to find out who has been giving confidential information to a local reporter. Gemma suspects Finn.

There is another complication: Gemma’s daughter, Grace, who is just six months old. Child care and lack of sleep along with working-mother guilt plague Gemma. Her fiancé, Brody, helps out, but he works, too, and is suddenly sent to China for his job. China is just a little too close to Japan and a woman Brody had an affair with. So Gemma, who is reluctant to tie the knot, has trust issues.

Littlejohn, a local author and librarian, is an excellent writer. The story gets a little spacey when Gemma tries to make a connection between the murders and a legend about the curse of the diary that is supposed to bring death at Lost Lake every 60 years. Still it’s a good mystery that few readers will figure out before the last pages.

“Everything She Didn’t Say” by Jane Kirkpatrick (Revell).

Carrie Strahorn is known to Western history for her 1911 memoir “Fifteen Thousand Miles by Stage.” In it, she tells of her adventures traveling throughout the West with her husband, Robert, a railroad travel writer and promoter.

Jane Kirkpatrick, the best-selling author of more than 20 novels based on the lives of real women, reads between the lines of Strahorn’s book and sees a woman whose life is not so fulfilling. “Everything She Didn’t Say” tells of a woman who follows her husband from adventure to adventure but at heart, yeans for a family and a home.

In a way, it’s hard to feel sorry for Strahorn, whose life was far more exciting than those of other Victorian women. After all, her husband made a pile of money, and she lived in an enormous mansion in the Northwest. She loved her husband, but she longed to be a real partner in his ventures. Instead of confiding in his wife and including her in decision-making, Robert blindsides her. His tendency to plunge into town promotions leaves them on the verge of bankruptcy several times, and they even have to flee in the middle of the night after one of their schemes goes bust.

Kirkpatrick is a master at portraying the emotions of women in a pre-feminist era. Strahorn, like Kirkpatrick’s other heroines, is torn between the role society thrusts upon her and the desire to be her own person. With compassion and humor, Kirkpatrick recreates an era in which women chafe under the controls of men but have little alternative. In real life, Carrie Strahorn may have kept her feelings to herself, but in “Everything She Didn’t Say,” Kirkpatrick has plenty to say for her.

Sandra Dallas is a Denver author. Contact her at sandradallas@msn.com.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/11/11/regional-books-residue-her-kind-of-case-and-more/

[jackdoakstx]

Hang out with Sally Field in Denver this month as she talks about her memoir “In Pieces”

Oscar- and Emmy-winning actor Sally Field will be in Denver this month to talk about and sign copies of her new memoir “In Pieces” at an event hosted by Tattered Cover Book Store.

Field’s memoir, which was released in September, explores her childhood and how acting helped her find a voice. The New York Times called it a “somber, intimate and at times wrenching self-portrait.”

The actor has won three Emmys for her respective roles in “ER,” “Brothers & Sisters” and “The Big Event.” She’s nabbed two Oscar awards for her performances in “Norma Rae Webster” and “Places in the Heart.” Her acceptance speech for the latter was the origin of Field’s oft incorrectly repeated quote, “You like me! You really like me!” (The correct quote was, “I can’t deny the fact that you like me. Right now, you like me!”)

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The book presentation will be held Saturday, Nov. 17, at 7 p.m. at the Trinity Methodist Church, 1820 Broadway. It will be moderated by Denver Post reporter John Wenzel.

Check-in begins at 5 p.m. Tickets cost $29 and include a copy of the book and a spot in the signing line. Seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis. Event tickets are only available of Eventbrite.

from News And Updates https://www.denverpost.com/2018/11/06/hang-out-with-sally-field-in-denver-this-month-as-she-talks-about-her-memoir-in-pieces/