Bozeman News

Western Book Roundup

High Plains Book Awards & Antonya Nelson’s Ghost Town

By Jenny Shank, 11-03-10

Antonya Nelson.

Fiction writer Antonya Nelson‘s appealing essay about how she and her husband Robert Boswell have purchased several decaying buildings in an unnamed Colorado ghost town ran last week in the New York Times.  Nelson explained why she wouldn’t name the town:

“I wish I could reveal the name of this town, but a longstanding family policy that forbids the naming of idyllic mountain villages, lest they turn into tourist enclaves, prevents me. My family bought a miner’s shack in Telluride, Colo., in 1961, and you see what happened there.”

So Nelson describes the town only in this way:

“An old Colorado mining town at 9,400 feet, it is a place that produced plenty of silver and other shiny booty back in the day, and even more toxic residue (it was a Superfund site not that long ago). It is isolated and incorporated, yet without a single business. ‘None of your business’ might be the town motto.”

Check out the witty article and the accompanying slide show for some purdy pictures of Colorado fall colors.

• The winners of the annual High Plains Book Awards were announced last month in Billings.  We featured most of these award-winning books earlier on New West.  Can we pick them, or what?  And New West poetry reviewer William Notter took home an award for his collection, so congratulations, Bill!  Click the links below to read our reviews of these books.

Fiction: Twisted Tree by Kent Meyers

Nonfiction: Lanterns on the Prairie: The Blackfeet Photographs of Walter McClintock, Steven L. Grafe, Editor

First Book: 600 Hours of Edward by Craig Lancaster

Poetry: Holding Everything Down by William Notter

Zonta Best Woman Writer Award: No Place Like Home by Linda Hasselstrom

• Printed Page Bookshop in Denver (1416 S. Broadway) will give away one free book for each non-perishable food item people bring in between now and December 24.  The food will be donated to East Denver FISH, “a small, non-profit emergency food pantry that has operated continuously in the Washington Park area since 1974.” And those who sign up to volunteer at East Denver FISH will receive a $25 gift certificate to Printed Page Bookshop.

• Joe Foster, formerly a buyer for Maria’s Books in Durango, Colo. and currently of Portland, Oreg. alerted his Twitter followers that Oprah will feature a guide to fly-fishing in Montana on her show this afternoon.  “Huh?” he wrote.  What’s up with that?  Sure enough, I checked Shelf Awareness, a newsletter for booksellers, and it noted that Brian Grossenbacher and Jenny Grossenbacher, authors of Fly Fishing Montana: A No Nonsense Guide to Top Waters (No Nonsense Fly Fishing Guidebooks, $28.95), will be featured on Oprah today.  We can only hope that there will be a segment with Oprah out in a Montana river, wearing gaiters.

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