Books We Loved in 2023
MILES TO GO: AN AFRICAN FAMILY IN SEARCH OF AMERICA ALONG ROUTE 66 Brennen Matthews (UNM Press) Author Brennen Matthews chronicles an eye-opening road trip with his family from Chicago to California…
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Tag: Books
What We're Reading: Thin Skin
MANY NEW MEXICANS critiqued Oppenheimer for omitting the local impact of nuclear development. The filmmakers should’ve read the title essay from Jenn Shapland’s deeply felt collection, Thin Skin…
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A Look into Lucy R. Lippard's Life
WRITER, ART CRITIC, CURATOR, AND ACTIVIST Lucy R. Lippard is no stranger to the publishing world. She has authored hundreds of articles and more than 20 books, including Pueblo Chico: Land and Lives…
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What We're Reading: New Mexico Fiestas
THE LONGEST-RUNNING FESTIVAL in the United States takes over the Santa Fe Plaza September 2–10. In New Mexico Fiestas: A History of Music, Dance & Fandango (The History Press), historian Ray John de…
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Will Grant Journeys into the Old West
IN MAY 2019, WILL GRANT AND HIS PARTNER, CLAIRE ANTOSZEWSKI, drove more than 700 miles from their home in Santa Fe to St. Joseph, Missouri, with Grant’s two horses, Chicken Fry and Badger, in tow. The…
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What We're Reading: Water for the People
IN OLIVIA ROMO’S “Bendición del Agua,” the poet fetches a ceremonial glass of water for her elder, then says a prayer of respect for both agua y abuelo. That poem (and rite) kicks off Water for the…
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Alisa Lynn Valdés’s New Hero Is Rooted in the Land
A LATINA LONGMIRE . That’s what Alisa Lynn Valdés says she had in mind when she began writing her New Mexico–set crime series starring rookie game warden Jodi Luna. The first book, Hollow Beasts , has…
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What We're Reading: Doña Cleanwell Leaves Home
MY BEST FRIEND AND I traded Ana Castillo’s The Mixquiahuala Letters back and forth during high school, inspired by the novel’s clear-eyed depiction of a long friendship between two women artists. In…
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What We're Reading: The Half White Album
“SOME CRITICS SAY you should never start or even use a dream in a story,” writes Cynthia J. Sylvester (Diné) in The Half-White Album (UNM Press), “but I’m awake now and pretending that it wasn’t a…
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What We're Reading: Susto
AFTER POET TOMMY ARCHULETA’S mother died, he found a heavily marked-up homemade book on curanderismo among her things. That mixture of ancestral and herbal lore informs his sensorily elegiac new…
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