Books & Reading
Southwest Books of the Year
Steven Phillips's Picks
Steven Phillips is publications manager for the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum.
An Architectural Guidebook to the National Parks: Southwest: Arizona-New Mexico-Texas
Harvey Kaiser. Gibbs Smith Publisher. 288pp. $16.95.
Looking for summer vacation ideas? The author selected 21 National Park Service units in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas that exhibit architectural significance and illustrate how diverse cultures responded to the harsh southwestern environment. Why do these sites appear where they do? Who built them? How were they built? What characters and events shaped their history? You'll learn where to find the largest collection of Pueblo Revival architecture in the National Park system, where to find the oldest, most intact 17th century Spanish missions in the U.S., where the successful but short-lived U.S. Camel Corps was based, where to explore Hohokam, Anasazi and Sinagua prehistory, and much more. Maps, informative sidebars and photographs round out this great little guidebook.
Battle Rock: The Struggle Over a One-Room School in America's Vanishing West
William Celis. Public Affairs Books. 256pp. $25.
Stephen Hanson, a well-traveled "ex-hippie" educator, took on the job of principal/teacher at a one-room school in Colorado's remote McElmo Canyon. It was more than he bargained for. The simple farming and ranching life in the canyon was being forever transformed by a steady stream of urban escapees who had values, attitudes, and intentions that were frequently at odds with those of long-time residents. As Hanson soon learned, the school often served as the battleground between these two groups. Author William Celis spent one academic year (1999-2000) immersing himself in the day-to-day activities of the school and in the lives of many of the canyon's residents. The result is a book that is both enlightening and entertaining. Thinking about escaping the city for the simple, harmonious life in small town America? Read this book before you pack.
Blanket Weaving in the Southwest
Joe Ben Wheat, edited by Ann Lane Hedlund. University of Arizona Press. 440pp. $75.
Reviewed by another panelist.
The Changing Mile Revisited: An Ecological Study of Vegetation Change With Time in the Lower Mile of an Arid and Semi-Arid Region
Raymond M. Turner, Robert H. Webb, Janice E. Bowers, James Rodney Hastings. University of Arizona Press. 334pp. $75.
The original Changing Mile, published in 1965, set a standard for the use of repeat photography in the study of ecosystem change. This volume, which adds three decades of data to the former book, uses 295 photographs taken at 98 photo stations to show the effects of climate and cultural stresses on the landscape of southern Arizona, Mexico's Pinacate region, and the coast of the Gulf of California over the last century. Even readers with limited interest in the subject matter will enjoy perusing the hundreds of historic photographs and noting changes and patterns.
Hiking the Southwest's Geology: Four Corners Region
Ralph Lee Hopkins. The Mountaineers Books. 286pp. $16.95.
It is impossible to visit the Four Corners region without thinking about geology. It is a land of breathtaking beauty where the sparse vegetation does little to hide some of America's most remarkable geologic formations. Geology is everywhere on display and author/photographer Ralph Lee Hopkins acts as interpreter in this handsome new book. He begins with a brief geology primer, then moves on to the hikes. The 50 hikes he describes include some of the Southwest's most popular, but also somewhere it is possible to explore the geologic wonders in relative peace. Each entry includes information on length, elevation, difficulty, recommended maps and special precautions, then gives a detailed discussion of the landscape you'll be encountering. Stunning full-color photos and occasional maps and illustrations add visual interest and clarity to the volume. This is a book that no Four Corners sojourner should be without.
Las Misiones Antiguas: The Spanish Missions of Baja California
Edward W. Vernon. University of New Mexico Press. 288pp. $44.95.
Reviewed by another panelist.
Native Plants for High Elevation Western Gardens
Janice Busco and Nancy R. Morin. The Arboretum at Flagstaff. 352pp. $29.95.
"Plantings of native species can re-create the harmonious communities seen in nature," write the authors. "In a garden they create a sense of place. They are aesthetically pleasing because they look right together." If you are a high-elevation gardener in the western United States and you've yet to experience the joy of growing native plants, consider this book a must-read. In the early chapters, authors Busco and Morin (the latter the director of The Arboretum at Flagstaff) serve up the basics, including how to evaluate and prepare your site, how and where to find the plants you want, how to plant and how to nurture your native plants through their first critical season. The rest of the book contains 150 plant descriptions accompanied by dazzling full-color photographs. Each description includes the plant's characteristics, native range, blooming season, outstanding features, cultural requirements, landscape uses, what wildlife the plant attracts, and suggested plant groupings.
The Parrot Trainer
Swain Wolfe. St. Martin's Press. 288pp. $24.95.
This rollicking, screwball novel follows the adventures (and misadventures) of an odd assortment of characters, including a tough-as-nails former professional pot hunter who spends his retirement sculpting huge, melting mud men, a rakish, pompous French theorist who's a bit too fond of the bottle, a young archaeologist struggling with issues of ethics and love, and a beautiful spirit goddess that may be nothing more than a venom-induced hallucination - but then again, maybe not. Add in a hidden cache of priceless Mimbres artifacts, a 10,000-year-old frozen body in an Alaskan glacier, a troublesome independent film crew, and a couple of ruffians called Rat and Raw Bone and you have the ingredients for a first-class southwestern archaeological thriller.
Puro Border: Dispatches, Snapshots & Graffiti from La Frontera
Luis Humberto Crosthwaite, John William Byrd and Bobby Byrd, editors. Cinco Puntos. 251pp. $18.95.
Puro Border is a diverse collection of writings and images about life along the U.S.-Mexico border. The Spanish word for "border," is "frontera." To some readers the book will be filled with shocking revelations; for others, its stories will be all too familiar; the dehumanizing effects of maquiladoras (factories), the violent world of the drug traffickers, racial profiling at border crossings, the unresolved deaths of 320 women in Juarez. But some of the most memorable essays are about more mundane topics, such as Luis Alberto Urrea's warm and entertaining recollection of childhood experiences in 1960 Tijuana, or Cecilia Balli's portrait of a used clothing maven, Jim Johnson. All in all, this rich assortment of essays, poems, illustrations and snapshots provides an important counterbalance to the often distorted picture of la frontera presented by our national media.
The River In Winter: New and Selected Essays
Stanley Crawford. University of New Mexico Press. 170pp. $21.95.
This evocative collection of essays by author, gardener, philosopher Stanley Crawford captures the essence of life in northern New Mexico like few other books. He throws a wide net, examining everything from the beauty of dirt floors and flat stones to the constant battles over water rights. Crawford skillfully exposes both the bright and dark sides of living in a small community: cooperation, participation, shared power, and a sense of connection are counterbalanced by a passion for pettiness, gossiping, and feuding. He writes, "It is through our gossip, our telling of tales, through our collective village novel that we will finally establish that we live at the center of the universeÑhowever insignificant this small place may seem to the great wide world."