Yesterday, Michigan Radio featured an interview with me and Fracture contributor Maryann Lesert on their Stateside program. We discussed fracking, the book, and our upcoming events in northern Lower Michigan. Listen here.
Category Archives: Public Appearances
More Michigan Fracture Events
Here are a couple photos from our April event at Lansing’s Everybody Reads. Sorry about the quality; we did have a professional photographer attend our Creston Wellness Center event, and I hope to share the photos from that soon.
Here also are a few more dates for upcoming Fracture readings in Michigan. As always, they are free and open to the public!
Saturday, August 6 – Traverse City, Michigan
Join us at the Horizon Books for a reading and book signing with contributors Stephanie Mills and Maryann Lesert as well as yours truly.
Details on the Horizon’s event page.
Tuesday, August 9 – Pellston, Michigan
The University of Michigan Biological Station will host a reading and discussion with me as well as contributors Maryann Lesert and Stephanie Mills.
Details on the UMBS event page.
Tuesday, September 20 – Lansing, Michigan
In partnership with Lansing Community College’s Science Department, Schuler Books (Eastwood) hosts the monthly discussion group Cafe Scientifique, an outreach program to promote public interest in science. This September, the group will discuss fracking and Fracture with contributor Maryann Lesert as their honored guest.
Find a list of Cafe Scientifique’s past events here.
There are still more events in the works, and on Thursday, I’m going into the studio with Maryann Lesert to talk to Lester Graham, host of Michigan Radio’s Stateside program. I’ll post those dates and a link to the interview when I have them!
A frequently updated list of past and upcoming readings can be found at the bottom of our page on the publisher’s (newly redesigned!) website. Be sure to follow both the book and the press on Facebook to keep up with the latest news, and tweet at us @icecubepress, @fractureanth, and @brooktrouting.
The Fracture Tour Continues
Photo by Taylor Brorby at our U Wyoming event
Here’s an update on our Michigan Fracture events, all of which are free and open to the public.
There are a couple more in the works—I’ll let you know when we have the details for you!
Tuesday, May 10 – Grand Haven, Michigan
Join us at the Bookman for a reading and book signing with contributors Stephanie Mills and Maryann Lesert as well as yours truly.
Details on the Bookman’s event page.
Tuesday, May 24 – Grand Rapids, Michigan
The Creston Wellness Center will host an evening of music by Sarah Barker and Max Lockwood as well as readings by contributor Maryann Lesert and myself. With just one week left to gather enough signatures to put fracking on Michigan’s 2016 ballot, the Committee to Ban Fracking in Michigan will be on site with petitions.
Find details about this event here.
Tuesday, August 9 – Pellston, Michigan
The University of Michigan Biological Station will host a reading and discussion with me as well as contributors Maryann Lesert and Stephanie Mills.
Details on the UMBS event page.
A frequently updated list of past and upcoming readings can be found at the bottom of our page on the publisher’s website.
Fracture on Tour
Since early February, my co-editor, Taylor Brorby, and many of our contributors have been sharing Fracture with audiences across America–from Pennsylvania to Colorado, from Wisconsin and Minnesota to Texas, and all across Ice Cube Press’s home state of Iowa and Taylor’s home state of North Dakota. Though Ice Cube Press is a “Midwest Book Publisher,” fracking and its impacts know no such geographical distinctions.
I’m looking forward to joining the tour in April, traveling throughout my own home state of Michigan and even all the way to Laramie, Wyoming. All events are free and open to the public.
Stay tuned for additional Michigan events (including Harmony Brewing and Creston Wellness Center in Grand Rapids, The Bookman in Grand Haven, and Schuler Books in Lansing) as we finalize dates, but for now, you can plan on the following opportunities:
Tuesday, April 12 – Grand Rapids, Michigan
Grand Rapids Community College‘s School of Arts and Sciences and English Department will host an evening of music by Sarah Barker and readings by contributors Maryann Lesert and Stephanie Mills as well as me. Details on our Facebook event page.
Saturday, April 16 – Laramie, Wyoming
The University of Wyoming Creative Writing Program will present an all-day event devoted to Fracture, including readings, presentations, and book signings with contributors Kathleen Dean Moore, Rick Bass, and Antonia Felix as well as both editors. Find details about this event here.
Saturday, April 23 – Lansing, Michigan
Everybody Reads will host a reading with contributors Maryann Lesert and Stephanie Mills as well as me. I’ll update this post with a link to the event page soon.
Tuesday, August 9 – Pellston, Michigan
The University of Michigan Biological Station will host a reading and discussion with contributors Maryann Lesert and Stephanie Mills as well as me. Details forthcoming on their event page.
A frequently updated list of past and upcoming readings can be found at the bottom of our page on the publisher’s website.
Fracture in the News
Fracture officially released February 14, and there has been a lot of great media coverage of the book since then, including a review in Flyway: Journal of Writing and Environment, an interview in Orion Magazine, and conversations with public radio.
One recent article we’re excited about is an online review by Thomas Fate for the Chicago Tribune. Here’s an excerpt:
Fracture includes a wide variety of voices and thinking, which is what keeps the book from slipping into what anthologies of social critique can become — cycles of guilt-laden lament, where the language of the activist overwhelms the language of the artist. In Fracture these two viewpoints somehow converge rather than compete, resulting in an innovative and compelling weave of writers who both educate and inspire.
Fracture will also be featured in their Sunday edition.
Another recent article worth calling out is by Adam Burke for Little Village magazine. In addition to promoting tomorrow’s reading at Prairie Lights, Burke sought to understand the significance of the book through the experiences of the editors and contributors. He interviewed both Taylor and me, plus three of our contributors, beautifully illustrating the range of perspectives and motivations you’ll find in Fracture.
“Bringing a book like Fracture into the world is important because our society needs to cultivate healthy, productive ways to talk about big contentious issues like hydraulic fracturing,” Trout said, adding, “We have not attempted to represent every side of the issue, but we have aimed to provide context for conversations about fracking and to illustrate just how complicated the issue is.”
Ice Cube Press frequently updates this page with links to reviews and local and national media reporting on the book.
Fracture features the voices of more than fifty writers. Preview two of them—Debra Marquart and Frederick L. Kirschenmann—in our second book trailer.
We are less than two weeks from our official release date, and those of us who have had the privilege of working on the book are thrilled to share Fracture with the rest of the world.
Enjoy this trailer by videographer extraordinaire Ana Hurtado and my co-editor, Taylor Brorby:
And now get yourself over to Ice Cube Press to order yourself a copy!
NAR Bicentennial Conference
Are you attending the North American Review’s Bicentennial Conference in Cedar Falls?
If so, check out the Ice Cube Press table at the book fair. Also, come see a publishing panel featuring me, fellow Prairie Gold editor Lance Sacknoff, and Ice Cube Press founder/CEO Steve Semken.
Saturday, June 13
J-3 Breaking into Publishing:
How to Transform a Manuscript into a First Publication
4:15-5:30, Bartlett Hall 0034
Local Wonders Event
AMES
Sunday, May 3, 2015, at 5:00 pm
Design on Main, 203 Main Street
This weekend is the 2015 Local Wonders Community Potluck sponsored by AgArts. Last year, the attendees voted for two winners of the 2014 Local Wonders Grant, one of which was Prairie Gold: An Anthology of the American Heartland. On Sunday, PG editor Lance Sacknoff will present on all the awesome things the AgArts grant helped us do. Find more details here.
We wrapped up Prairie Gold‘s Midwestern book tour at the biggest literary conference in North America. (NBD.) Here are some photos from our epic reading at Subtext Books, featuring work by Lindsay Tigue, Matthew Fogarty, Sandy Marchetti, Nancy Cook, Sarah Turner, Stephanie Schultz, John Linstrom, Michelle Menting, and Molly Rideout.
Also, since I’m always the one taking the photos, I’m never in them. But Sandy caught a shot of me listening attentively:
And here are a few photos from the book fair, including our author signing–all three editors united again!
AWP 2015
Festival of Language
Last night’s Festival of Language was incredible. Seven hours of back-to-back readings at Brit’s Pub–I’ve never seen anything like it before.
Watch me read “First Beard” and “Performance Review” on this low-quality video recording.
Fun in the Twin Cities: AWP Events
Are you attending AWP 2015 in Minneapolis?
Please stop by the Ice Cube Press booth at the book fair, Exhibit Space 119. Also, consider checking out the following featured events.
Wednesday, April 8
AWP Festival of Language 2015
Brit’s Pub Vault, 1110 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis
The seventh annual celebration of language and literary arts will feature established and emerging writers in three sets of rapid-fire readings with over 60 participants reading for a maximum of five minutes each.
The festival starts at 4:00 and ends at 11:00. I’ll be reading in the 8:30-10:30 set.
My Festival Writer publications
Thursday
Prairie Gold Contributor Signings
Ice Cube Press Exhibit Space 119
Two Prairie Gold contributors, Matthew Fogarty and Sarah Turner, will sign books at the Ice Cube Press booth, Exhibit Space 119.
Catch Fogarty from 12:00-1:30 and Turner from 4:30-6:00.
Prairie Gold Reading and Celebration of Midwestern Writing
Subtext Books, 165 Western Ave N, St. Paul
Readings from contributors to Prairie Gold, a collection of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry that delves into the nuances of Midwestern identity. The event starts at 6:30 and ends at 9:00. Here’s the line-up:
- Lindsay Tigue (poetry)
- Matthew Fogarty (fiction)
- Sandy Marchetti (poetry)
- John Linstrom (nonfiction)
- Nancy Cook (poetry)
- Stephanie Schultz (poetry)
- Sarah Turner (nonfiction)
- Michelle Menting (poetry)
- Molly Rideout (fiction)
(H/T to John Linstrom for finding links to everyone’s author pages.)
Friday
Prairie Gold Editor Signings
Flyway: Journal of Writing & Environment Exhibit Space 1314
All three Prairie Gold contributors, Lance M. Sacknoff, Xavier Cavazos, and I, Stefanie Brook Trout, will sign books from 10:00-11:00 a.m. at the Flyway/Iowa State MFA program table, Exhibit Space 1314.
More about ISU’s MFA program in Creative Writing & Environment
*
Also, Taylor Brorby and I will be spreading the word throughout the conference:
We are still taking submissions for Fracture: Essays, Poems, and Stories on Fracking in America. The deadline for submissions is June 1.
Read our submission guidelines and our call for visual art.
Happy Aldo Leopold Week!
There are some who can live without wild things and some who cannot.
Though Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac was written in and about Wisconsin, Leopold was born in Burlington, Iowa, and that’s where his love of nature first began to emerge. Last fall, the State of Iowa proclaimed the first full week of March as Aldo Leopold Week, a time to celebrate and pay tribute to Leopold’s legacy as a leader in conservation.
As a writer, I also see Aldo Leopold Week as a time to celebrate and reflect on nature writing, a genre that influences my own writing deeply. I don’t define myself primarily as a nature writer because the term is limited, and I don’t build fences between what I do and don’t do, but my experiences writing about nature were certainly what inspired me to pursue writing seriously and remains a passion of mine.
(Those interested in beginning nature writing should check out this excellent resource: “Henry Thoreau as a Model for Nature Writing” by Ron Harton.)
Great Reads
I wanted to take this opportunity to call out some amazing nature writing texts. There are hundreds of books shelved under the category of “Nature Writing” on Goodreads, and there are a lot that I haven’t read. I’m not including any books on this list that I haven’t read in their entirety, and while I’m ashamed to admit it, there are some really important books that I’ve only read in excerpts.
It’s worth acknowledging that this list is more than 75% white men. For a long time, the genre was largely dominated by white men, but there are now plenty of excellent nature writing texts by women and people of color. I just haven’t read them all yet, and a lot of the ones to which I’ve been exposed, I haven’t had the chance to enjoy in their entirety yet. Don’t worry. It is a priority of mine. Many are sitting on my bookshelf right now, just waiting for their turn.
Therefore, please don’t see this list as my nature writing canon–far from it. I can only recommend that which I know, and unfortunately, my formal literary education focused primarily on white men, and I’m still in the process of making up for lost time. Check out that Goodreads shelf I mentioned, and you’ll see a more diverse array of nature writing texts.
One more thing worth noting is that I don’t actually use the category of “nature writing” to organize my own books on Goodreads. It’s too hard for me to define. I use the much broader “environment.” I didn’t want to overthink what is or isn’t nature writing for this blog post, so the following list is based on the Goodreads hive mind. If people are shelving it under “nature writing,” then I counted it. If they aren’t, then I didn’t. I expect controversy.
Without further ado, here are just a few great nature writing books besides A Sand County Almanac with Other Essays on Conservation from Round River by Aldo Leopold. They appear in alphabetical order, not in any order of preference.
- Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey
- The Lives of Rocks by Rick Bass
- A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson
- Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England by William Cronon
- The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins
- The Snows of Kilimanjaro and Other Stories by Ernest Hemingway
- A Small Place by Jamaica Kincaid
- Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life by Barbara Kingsolver
- Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
- The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert
- The Singing Wilderness by Sigurd F. Olson
- The Wilding by Benjamin Percy
- The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World by Michael Pollan
- In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan
- Living Downstream: A Scientist’s Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment by Sandra Steingraber
- Walden by Henry David Thoreau
- Words from the Land: Encounters with Natural History by Stephen Trimble (editor)
- Biophilia by Edward O. Wilson
- The Diversity of Life by Edward O. Wilson
- The Future of Life by Edward O. Wilson
Lots of omissions here, I know, and probably plenty of books that would be better classified elsewhere. The point is not to for me to establish the nature writing canon but to spark discussion, so discuss!
What are your favorite nature writing books? What are the most offensive omissions (which may be either because I haven’t read a critical nature writing text yet or because the Goodreads community hasn’t yet shelved the work as “nature writing”)? What doesn’t belong on this list? Often we think of nature writing as nonfiction, yet a few fiction texts made the list–but no poetry. Does nature writing have to be nonfiction? Within nonfiction, do research (rather than observation) based texts count? Does any of this even matter?
Ames Reads Leopold
Though this is the first annual Aldo Leopold Week, communities nationwide have been celebrating Aldo Leopold Weekend on the first weekend of March since 2004. And Saturday, March 7, will be the eighth annual Ames Reads Leopold event.
I had the pleasure of reading “Axe-in-Hand” at last year’s Ames Reads Leopold, and this year, I am thrilled to be reading “January Thaw.”
The event is free and open to the public. You can expect readings from Leopold’s work, a screening of the Emmy award winning documentary Green Fire, and an overall good time. It’s also a great opportunity to check out the newly renovated Ames Public Library if you haven’t had the chance to do that yet. Check out this news release for more information.
Readings in Cedar Falls and Iowa City: January 29-30
Cedar Falls
Thursday, January 29, 2015, at 7:00 pm
Hearst Center for the Arts, 304 W Seerley Boulevard
Fellow Prairie Gold editor Lance M. Sacknoff and I will be traveling up to Cedar Falls on Thursday to discuss writing and publishing with the Craft of Fiction students at University of Northern Iowa.
That evening, we will read as part of the Final Thursday Reading Series at the Hearst Center for the Arts, followed by a Q&A and book signing.
For more details, visit the Hearst Center’s website or download their Winter 2015 brochure [PDF].
Iowa City
Friday, January 30, 2015, at 5:00 pm
Englert Theatre, 221 E Washington Street
Fellow Fracture editor Taylor Brorby and I will be joining other artists for Beyond the Anthropocene, an exhibit and opening reception exploring “the illusory boundary between what is ‘natural’ and what is ‘man-made.'” Showcasing the work of three photographers, one musician, and five writers, the exhibit is part of the University of Iowa’s Obermann Humanities Symposium, “Energy Cultures in the Age of the Anthropocene,” March 5-7, 2015.
More details on our January reading here.
Info about the March symposium here.
“Anthology Delivers Fine Offerings”: A Review of Prairie Gold in the Wapsipinicon Almanac
This volume was no doubt a massive undertaking, and the effort has paid off. It will interest anyone who sees who they are as a product of where they are, and will especially appeal to those who sometimes feel that, in the words of Bakopolous, it is “almost too beautiful to bear that rolling countryside without a notebook and pen in hand.”
Pick up a copy of the latest Wapsipinicon Almanac (No. 21) to read more of what Tad Boehmer had to say in his review of Prairie Gold: An Anthology of the American Heartland.
Also in that issue, check out Robert Leonard’s essay, “Iowa: ‘Land of Enchantment’ – A Literary Manifesto,” in which he discusses Iowa’s cultural narratives and how Ice Cube Press “has done more than any in the past couple of decades in publishing books about Iowa, many of them by Iowans.”
Stefanie Brook Trout 