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Sunday, May 25
 

9:00am MDT

How Water Shapes Us-Fountain Creek, a look at environment and community values
Sunday May 25, 2025 9:00am - 10:00am MDT
Join authors Jim O'Donnell and Jonathan Thompson to talk about water and how it shapes community and vice versa.


From its headwaters high up Colorado’s legendary Pike’s Peak to suburban concrete-lined canals, Fountain Creek has endured nearly everything humans could do to a single watershed. It has been dammed, diverted, drained, poisoned, restored, exploited, ignored—and yet it has survived.

Journalist and archeologist Jim O’Donnell grew up exploring among the beavers and discarded beer bottles that have long populated Fountain Creek. Irreverent, deeply knowledgeable, and endlessly curious, O’Donnell guides us through the contradictions and complexities of one of the most heavily urbanized areas in one of the fastest-growing states in the nation.
 
Fountain Creek is at once a reflection of our ever-changing relationship to the natural world and a challenge for each of us to reexamine the many ways we are connected to the world around us, to water, and to each other.


Speakers
avatar for Jonathan Thompson

Jonathan Thompson

Jonathan Thompson is a writer, editor and journalist who has been covering the lands and communities of the Western U.S. since 1996, when he signed on as the Silverton Standard & the Miner’s sole reporter. Since then he has worked in a variety of roles — from editor-in-chief to... Read More →
avatar for Jim O'Donnell

Jim O'Donnell

Journalist and archeologist Jim O’Donnell grew up exploring among the beavers and discarded beer bottles that have long populated Fountain Creek. Irreverent, deeply knowledgeable, and endlessly curious, O’Donnell guides us through the contradictions and complexities of one of... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 9:00am - 10:00am MDT
1 Steddy Theater

9:00am MDT

Poetry (YA) Workshop-Possibility of Poetry: Considering Verse in MG&YA Novels
Sunday May 25, 2025 9:00am - 10:00am MDT
The Possibility of Poetry: Considering Verse in MG & YA Novels

Are you intrigued by all the novels in verse that are finding their way into the marketplace? Author and poet Megan E. Freeman will explore a variety of middle grade and young adult verse novels and their broad appeal to reluctant and enthusiastic readers alike. Megan will give a behind-the-scenes look into how verse novels are crafted, and will provide all participants with an annotated bibliography, a deeper understanding of the differences between verse and prose, and resources to support you as a reader, a writer, or in your classroom.

Megan E. Freeman attended an elementary school where poets visited her classroom every week to teach poetry, and she has been a writer ever since. Her New York Times bestselling novel in verse, ALONE, won the Colorado Book Award, the California, Illinois, Indiana, Japan, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Nebraska, and Vermont Children’s Book Awards, is an NCTE Notable Verse Novel, and is included on over two dozen "best of" and state reading lists. Megan is also a Pushcart Prize-nominated poet, and her poetry chapbook, Lessons on Sleeping Alone, was published by Liquid Light Press. Her latest novel, AWAY, was an instant New York Times and Indie Bestseller and is a companion novel to ALONE, told in hybrid formats. Megan used to live in northeast Los Angeles, central Ohio, northern Norway, and on Caribbean cruise ships. Now she divides her time between northern Colorado and the Texas Gulf Coast.
Speakers
avatar for Megan Freeman

Megan Freeman

Megan E. Freeman attended an elementary school where poets visited her classroom every week to teach poetry, and she has been a writer ever since. Her New York Times bestselling novel in verse, ALONE, won the Colorado Book Award, the California, Illinois, Indiana, Japan, Kentucky... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 9:00am - 10:00am MDT
3 Hawk Room

9:00am MDT

Memoir Workshop with Deborah Jackson Taffa-The Act of Self Confrontation TICKETED
Sunday May 25, 2025 9:00am - 10:00am MDT
The Act of Self-Confrontation in Memoir:

If you weren’t frightened by what others might think, what story would you tell? In this class, we’ll explore the act of ethical remembering, how to create characters out of your people, and how to build a persona for yourself. Through close readings, craft lessons, and discussion, we will explore your subjective lens, the role of fear and honesty in memoir, and the importance of honoring your nesting dolls and/or former selves. We’ll examine the impulse (and pitfalls) of cautionary tales and discuss the role of counterintuitive insights in finding greater contexts for your story.

Deborah Taffa’s Whiskey Tender, a National Book Award Finalist 2024, as well as a longlisted title for the 2025 Carnegie Medal for Excellence, was named to the year’s best lists at Time MagazineEsquire, NPR, Publisher’s WeeklyThe AtlanticAudible, and other outlets. With awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, PEN America, MacDowell, the Ellen Meloy Foundation, Tin House, and the NY Summer Writers Institute, Deborah received her MFA in Iowa City. Her work can be found at The Boston Review, PBS, SalonThe LA Review of Books, and elsewhere. A citizen of the Kwatsaan Nation and Laguna Pueblo, she is the director of the MFA CW program at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM.
Speakers
avatar for Deborah Taffa

Deborah Taffa

Deborah Taffa’s Whiskey Tender, a National Book Award Finalist 2024, as well as a longlisted title for the 2025 Carnegie Medal for Excellence, was named to the year’s best lists at Time Magazine, Esquire, Publisher’s Weekly, The Atlantic, Audible, Esquire, and other outlets... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 9:00am - 10:00am MDT
2 King Room

10:15am MDT

Blue Plate: Food Lovers Guide to Climate Chaos TICKETED
Sunday May 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:15am MDT
Join Mark, Thomas Kostigen (Cool Food), and Laura Krantz for a riveting conversation on the food we eat and how we can change the planet for good! 
Mark Easter is the author of The Blue Plate: A Food Lovers Guide to Climate Chaos, published by Patagonia Books in 2024. In it, he explores the question “Can we eat our way out of the climate crisis?” 
Mark is an ecologist and greenhouse gas accountant who has researched the carbon emissions from food, forestry, and fiber in academia and private industry for more than two decades. He spent much of his career working with farmers, ranchers, foresters and scientists around the world, researching how historical and modern agriculture contributed to the warming climate, and identifying both new and old farming and ranching methods that not only reduce the dangerous climate emissions behind our daily plates of food, but reverse those emissions wherever possible by drawing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere back into the soil.


Speakers
avatar for Thomas Kostigen

Thomas Kostigen

Thomas Kostigen is an award-winning and New York Times bestselling author and journalist. He founded the Climate Survivalist column for USA Today and has written for numerous publications, including the Washington Post, National Geographic, Discover, Departures, the Los Angeles Times... Read More →
avatar for Laura Krantz

Laura Krantz

Laura Krantz is a journalist, editor and producer, in both radio and print, and co-founder of Foxtopus Ink. Her podcast, Wild Thing has received critical acclaim from Scientific American, Rolling Stone, and The Atlantic, which named it one of the best 50 podcasts in 2018 and 2020... Read More →
avatar for Mark Easter

Mark Easter

Mark Easter is an ecologist, greenhouse gas accountant, and writer who explores the beauty, wonder, and challenges of life on the spinning blue marble we call Earth. Originally from Nebraska, Mark attended college in Indiana and Vermont, and has been fortunate to work around the globe... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:15am MDT
1 Steddy Theater

10:15am MDT

Mining Your Life for Fiction with Olivia Chadha
Sunday May 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:15am MDT
Join Mountain Words favorite author Olivia Chadha for a deep dive into finding topics and a voice for the story that connects to your life to deepen the quality of your writing.  

Olivia writes science fiction, fantasy, comic books, and literary novels for MG, YA, and adult audiences. She has a Ph.D. in literature and creative writing and her research centers on the history of exile, India’s Partition, precarious borders and boundaries, global folklore and fairy tales, and the relationship between humans, machines and the environment. BALANCE OF FRAGILE THINGS is her debut adult literary novel. RISE OF THE RED HAND, her YA debut, was awarded the Colorado Book Award for Young Adult Literature. Book two of The Mechanists Series, FALL OF THE IRON GODS was released April 2024. She is a contributor to the YA folk horror anthology THE GATHERING DARK (Page Street), the desi anthology MAGIC HAS NO BORDERS (HarperTeen), and the STAR WARS anthology, Return of the Jedi: From A Certain Point of View. She lives in Colorado with her family.
Speakers
avatar for Olivia Chadha

Olivia Chadha

Olivia Chadha writes science fiction, fantasy, comic books, and literary novels for MG, YA, and adult audiences. She has a Ph.D. in literature and creative writing and her research centers on the history of exile, India’s Partition, precarious borders and boundaries, global folklore... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:15am MDT
2 King Room

10:15am MDT

Orchids, Orchids, Orchids: Repetition as Revolution, Poetry w/Erica Reid TICKETED
Sunday May 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:15am MDT
Guided by poems from Kaveh Akbar, Wendy Videlock, A. E. Stallings, Joy Harjo, and more, this class examines the ways that the repetition of a single word can have a cumulative and explosive effect on a poem.

Erica Reid is the author of Ghost Man on Second, winner of the Donald Justice Poetry Prize (Autumn House Press, 2024). Erica’s poems appear in Rattle, Cherry Tree, Colorado Review, and more. Erica is a 2025 Fellow at the Vermont Center for the Creative Arts and teaches in Western Colorado University’s MFA program. ericareidpoet.com
Speakers
avatar for Erica Reid

Erica Reid

Erica Reid is the author of Ghost Man on Second, winner of the Donald Justice Poetry Prize (Autumn House Press, 2024). Erica’s poems appear in Rattle, Cherry Tree, Colorado Review, and more. Erica is a 2025 Fellow at the Vermont Center for the Creative Arts and teaches in Western... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:15am MDT
3 Hawk Room

11:30am MDT

Fiction Workshop with Shelley Read TICKETED
Sunday May 25, 2025 11:30am - 12:15pm MDT
Join author Shelley Read for a fiction driven workshop. 
Speakers
avatar for Shelley Read

Shelley Read

Shelley Read’s international bestselling debut novel, Go As A River, is translated into thirty-four languages and appears on bestseller lists worldwide. Winner of the 2024 High Plains Book Award for Fiction and the 2023 Reading the West Award for Best Debut, Go As A River is also... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 11:30am - 12:15pm MDT
2 King Room

1:00pm MDT

The Arctic Traverse @Gunnison Library TICKETED
Sunday May 25, 2025 1:00pm - 2:15pm MDT
Michael Englehard will share his outdoor adventures featured in his book, Arctic Traverse: A Thousand-Mile Summer of Trekking the Brooks Range
2024 National Outdoor Book Award Winner in Journeys
2024 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Awards Finalist in Nature


"Engelhard locates life—biological, cultural, and geophysical—in every mile of this vast, wild landscape." —Robert Moor, author of On Trails: An Exploration

A lyrical memoir that interweaves wilderness, homeland, cultural connections, historical figures, humor, and gritty experiences across northern Alaska, Arctic Traverse: A Thousand-Mile Summer of Trekking the Brooks Range takes readers along on a once-in-a-lifetime journey.

From the award-winning author of Ice Bear: The Cultural History of an Arctic Icon comes an intimate exploration of Alaska’s northernmost mountain range with observations on Indigenous cultures, conservation, and intense cross-country travel, all shaped by respect for the land. Follow author Michael Engelhard through tussock-studded tundra for a remarkable tale of bear encounters and white-knuckled river moments, as well as poetic reflections on a vast, untamed landscape. A trained anthropologist, Engelhard evokes classic writers like Edward Abbey, Barry Lopez, and Ellen Meloy with profound dives into human and natural history and vivid meditations on Alaskan wildlife, flora, and geology. When he embarked on this thru-hike, fewer people had completed it solo in a single push than had dived to the floor of the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of Earth’s oceans.

Much more than a captivating account of a human-powered solo thru-hike and float, Arctic Traverse illuminates the spirit of Alaska, drawing on encounters with Indigenous elders, guided clients, scientists, and others as well as on Engelhard’s long-held dream and his experiences of the land itself.
Speakers
avatar for Michael Engelhard

Michael Engelhard

Trained as an anthropologist with a degree from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Michael Engelhard worked for twenty-five years as a wilderness guide and outdoor instructor in Alaska and on the Colorado Plateau. The editor of four anthologies and author of Ice Bear, a cultural... Read More →
Sunday May 25, 2025 1:00pm - 2:15pm MDT
6 Gunnison County Public Library
 
Mountain Words Festival
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