Non-fiction for the cold, hard facts, fiction for flights of fancy. One grounds you while the other sets you spinning. Most of the time, maybe, but my experience this week perfectly inverts that paradigm. I’ve been reading a brand-new book from Oscar-winning documentarian Errol Morris, who is best known as the filmmaker behind such projects …
The Smell of Other People’s Houses by Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock This profound young adult novel, written by a fourth-generation Alaskan, examines the 70’s-era culture of so many small towns in that part of the world, where domestic violence, alcoholism, child abuse and poverty are still the highest in the nation. The story is told in alternating …
When I met Meagan Macvie, during the first minutes of our three-year MFA program, she was buried in a book, occasionally peeking up through her glasses to observe us all getting to know each other. An introverted bookworm, I thought, and I was right about the bookworm part. Just check out her answer below when …
When my first novel, The Snow Child, was published, people often asked me if I had done a lot of research during the writing process. In truth, I hadn’t. I discovered several retellings of the Russian Snegurotchka fairy tale, and at one point I interviewed an elderly man who had grown up in Alaska and …
English astrophysicist Yasmin and her deaf 10-year old daughter Ruby arrive in Anchorage to join their wildlife filmmaker husband/father who has being staying in a tiny Inupiat village in the far north. At the airport they are met not by Matt but by the police, who inform Yasmin there’s been a tragic accident and everyone …
REI raingear, Keens, Subarus, and, these days, requisite Bernie Sanders stickers. You can spot a Pacific Northwesterner from as far away as the Redwood forest and the Gulf Stream waters. As a resident of the Pacific Northwest since the late 1970s, I can play the part sublimely, although hints of my New York accent surface …
If the land and people of Alaska beckon you, stop and take a close look at this memoir. Already read one of Kantner’s books? Then you know the treat you’re in with this one. If you haven’t, this one is a great one to begin with. Living above the Artic Circle, Kantner keeps the stories …
Kim Heacox has been awarded the the National Outdoor Book Award for Outdoor Literature (Fiction) for his novel, Jimmy Bluefeather. Heacox, a nature writer and photographer, was haunted for over a decade by a character that now lives in Jimmy Bluefeather. Old Keb “spoke to him”—wise and witty—about adventures, love, growing old, and reconciliation. A labor …
Jimmy Bluefeather, the new novel from award-winning writer, photographer, and conservationist Kim Heacox, is the first work of original adult fiction released by Alaska Northwest Books in fifty-six years of publishing. The collaborators recently got together to discuss their groundbreaking effort. AN: Alaska roots this novel and plays a large part in the overall story line. How does the …
