Southwest Book Reviews

What does it mean to have a voice? That’s the question Terry Tempest Williams tries to answer in her illuminating book, ‘When Women Were Birds’. It begins with the shock of discovering that the journals her mother kept until her death were completely empty. Williams had to find her own voice to deal with the loss. In KNAU’s latest Southwest Book Review, Mary Sojourner reflects on process of finding one’s authentic voice.

Horace Hopper is the feisty protagonist in Willy Vlautin’s latest novel "Don’t Skip Out on Me." Horace is a former foster kid with an identity crisis, half-Paiute, half-Irish, raised in Nevada by aging sheep ranchers, with dreams of being a championship boxer. To reinvent himself, Horace leaves the safety of his foster parents for the streets of Tucson and Las Vegas, but learns he can’t outrun his past or his destiny. Mary Sojourner has more in KNAU’s latest Southwest Book Review.

Award-winning journalist Jessica Bruder went on the road to write her latest book "Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century." She chronicles the lives of older Americans living in campers and vans, trying to stay afloat after job loss, health problems and a deteriorating American Dream. Bruder is a pro at writing about the dark underbelly of the nation’s economy and the subcultures of people affected. "Nomadland" is the focus of this month’s Southwest Book Review by Mary Sojourner.

Prospero Stark was once a baseball phenom. But after a stint in jail, he changed his pace, opting to live in an airstream trailer park in the Arizona desert. It’s there that he receives a gruesome package … the severed hand of his former catcher. This is the jumping off point for Leo Banks’ novel, "Double Wide," the focus of this month’s Southwest Book Review. KNAU’s Mary Sojourner has more. 

“Abracadabra” is the latest novel by Southwestern writer David Kranes. Set in Las Vegas in the noir tradition of writing, the story begins with the mysterious magic show disappearance of an unassuming character named Mark Goodson. From there, the plot unfolds in twists and turns, mistaken identities, celebrity impersonators and all around chaos. “Abracadabra” is the focus of this month’s Southwest Book Review by Mary Sojourner.