I belong to two book clubs (Truckee AND South Lake Tahoe) and, on average, read about three books a month. I usually like the club selections and always love talking about them, even if I found the book challenging.  My book clubs stimulate conversations unlike those I have in other settings and are an essential part of my social fabric.   But the two books that impacted me the most this year, I read outside of book club. These books uniquely resonated with me in these tim

Well, the summer of 2025 was filled with Northern California author talks to promote my memoir RISK, podcast interviews, engaging in various acts of resistance to the assault on public lands, speaking on author panels at my first literary festivals, along with many blissful days of Tahoe stay-cation What I learned from author talks is that no matter how small the audience, there was always at least one person—or a few—who made me feel my effort was worth it.  I may not have s

The Missouri River Wild (Montana) As the assault continues, I am once again drawn to devote this month’s blog to public lands advocacy....

Standing on the side of the Klamath River in sight of its confluence with the Pacific Ocean, I strained to see paddlers emerge from the thick rolling fog. I had come specifically for this moment, to bear witness to two dozen young team members of Paddle Tribal Waters, as they completed their first descent of 310 miles of the recently undammed Klamath River.   For some time, I have been vicariously following this historic endeavor to restore the Klamath River through the remov