ALASKA WRITERS GUILD · 2010-12-21 · story of their beloved lab who one day ran with them no more. And Clover, the rufous hummingbird that his wife Sherry, nursed back to health,

Jefferson Randolph

“Soapy” Smith of Skagway fame liked to imbibe a bit and one of his favorite drinks was called “giggle soup.”

During the last Interglacial more than 125,000 years ago, humans hy-bridized with the R’il’nai and spread across the galaxy to colonize other planets. Although they formed The Confederation, they still depended on the R’il’nai for guidance and protection—not only from the Maungs but from each other.

But only one of the pureblood R’il’nai still lives—Lai, an embittered survivor who mourns his lost human love but is still bound to honor his race’s responsibility to the Confederation. Two others possess the poten-tial to change his and the Confederation’s future—Snowy, a young slave dancer who is frightened of his special powers, and Marna, a healer who survived a planet-wide epidemic on her home world.

Each has their own individual loyalty which puts them in conflict with one another, but the only way they can summon a future to benefit all is to work together.

Sue Ann Bowling earned a bachelor’s degree in physics at Radcliffe/Harvard and a Ph.D. in geophysics from the University of Alaska. After thirty years of research and teaching, she retired to focus on writing. Bowling has lived in Alaska for forty-five years. Visit her Web site on canine color genet-ics at http://bowlingsite.mcf.com/Genetics/Genetics.html.

SCIENCE FICTION

U.S. $XX.XX

HOMECOMINGSU

E AN

N B

OW

LING

Cover Photo: 1995 J.P. Harrington (University of Maryland, College Park);Prof. K. J. Borkowski (North Carolina State University), NASA.

HOMECOMINGby Sue Ann Bowling

A boy must learn to use his differences. The last survivor of a dying species seeks love. And a woman struggles to retain her sanity after two hundred years alone.

Snowy is a young slave who

has never known any other life than one of servitude. However, he and his friends have figured out a way that allows them to stay together. They dance so well together that they sell for a higher amount as a group than as individuals. The life of a pleasure slave isn’t a good one, but Snowy and his friends make the best out of a bad arrangement, and Snowy has special gifts that allow him to make things as easy for them as possible.

It’s easy to feel a little overwhelmed with HOMECOMING because there are a lot of characters that are tied to one another in some form or another. Fortunately, the author does a good job of keeping things in order so it doesn’t become too confusing. Snowy/Roi is a likable character and that makes him entertaining to read about. I felt his fear as a slave trying desperately to keep his little family together, and I felt that fear slide towards terror when he was introduced to his new life. He’s known some decent R’il’noid slave owners, but the majority of them were twisted and depraved.

While HOMECOMING has an ending that confidently wraps up all the loose ends in this part of Roi’s life, I’m left with the hope that Ms Bowling might one day let us see how Roi is doing as an adult. If you’re looking for a science fiction adventure that has some thought behind it, I highly recommend this story.

Reviewed by Marty ShawISBN 9781450213158Softcover $15.56iUniverse

A CLUELESSMAN’S GUIDE TORELATIONSHIPS

by Kelly C. Fisher

Every married man has been single and every man, single or married, is clueless. If you don’t believe that, ask any woman. If you are a man and don’t know what to do, here’s a book that will help.

There is an old saying that if

you are digging yourself into a hole, the first thing you should do is stop digging. When it comes to relationships, men are clueless. I know. I’m a man. I have a wife and she tells me how clueless I am.

If you are a man you have three choices when it comes to getting clued in. First, do nothing and spend the rest of your life living in a cave. Second, get married and have your wife constantly tell you what you are doing wrong. Or you can get a leg up on the situation by reading this book. What is particularly enlightening about the book – for a man – is a collection of common sense tidbits for men who don’t have a clue. Some of those tidbits include such gems as “Don’t Fix Your Partner’s Problems” unless she asks for help, “Attack and You Lose” and “What Was Your Purpose in Making that Response?”

This book was written by an expert. He says so on page 20, “each of my four wives ha[d] a quirk that surprised me.” Take his advice. Don’t make all the mistakes he did.

Reviewed by Steven C. Levi ISBN 9780984129607 softcover $12.99 Seven Pillars Press

COLD RIVER SPIRITS by Jan Harper-Hanes

In the beginning there was only one practical way for outsiders to penetrate Alaska’s wild interior. Passage was the Yukon River and its tributaries, which had been under control of the Athabascan Indians since earliest memory.

High profile among these people was a family later to be known as the Harpers. When European and American fortune-hunters settled among them, handsome Athabascan women found it convenient to make romantic alliances with the foreigners.

COLD RIVER SPIRITS

is an inspirational story of cultural assimilation told from an insider’s perspective. Jan Harper-Haines offers a fascinating saga of her people and their transition from the wild waterways, which they had ruled with deference to its many spirits, to fast-track modern American life.

The author pieced together her family’s story with help from her grandmother, mother, and others caught in the cultural tug-of-war yet who survived with self-respect, humor, and perceptions intact.

Through Harper-Haines’s clear voice, the river spirits revered by her Athabascan ancestors also survive. Beware, reader, these spirits lurk around the next bend in the river just as they did when the Yukon was a much younger river and no one who lived on its great bounty had ever heard of God.

Review by Jim Misko ISBN: 0-945397-85-2 Hardcover Price: $19.95Epicenter

CADZOW by Steven C. Levi

Cadzow, a Gwich’in Athabascan Indian, is working in the Juneau mines in 1910 when he is falsely accused of robbing the mine’s payroll. Now he has to stay ahead of the lynch mob on his trail.

Cadzow is a Gwich’in

Athabascan Indian working deep underground for the owner of one of Juneau’s seven gold mines. In this company town in 1910, Cadzow is trying the impossible: to get enough out of debt to grubstake a trapping season in the forests he prefers and knows so well. Although out of his normal element in town, Cadzow has been around white men long enough to have a certain savvy in both worlds.

Using historic events from the 1898 Chilkoot Trail and the later heyday of mining in Juneau, the author introduces readers to shady characters from a time when gold fever was epidemic and trust was the first casualty. Meet Tlingit Indians, hermit prospectors, vigilantes, gamblers, and the landscapes of Alaska’s Inside Passage and neighboring Canada.

The author has a fine talent for description, dialogue, and story. Just when you think the outcome of CADZOW is in the bag, the plot takes twists that rival the crevasses in the Mendenhall Glacier featured in this novel of Alaska adventure.

Steven Levi is a local his-torian with sense of place gained from living and travel-ing in bush Alaska. He spent a decade researching the people and events of the gold rush and has also written a popular non-fiction account, BOOM AND BUST IN THE ALASkA GOLDfIELDS: A MULTI-CULTURAL ADVENTURE.

Review by Elaine RhodeISBN 1-897370-19-9Softcover $16.95 Lachesis Publishing

GLACIER WOLf by Nick Jans

Follow award-winning Alaska writer Nick Jans on a journey through Southeast Alaska. Crafted in vivid, lyr-ical prose, these 26 personal essays combine high adven-ture, humor, and moments of poignant insight.

GLACIER WOLf is a

sparkling collection of essays of life in Southeast Alaska. About a wolf living alone near a glacier but interacting with many of the people and dogs of Juneau. The book also holds stories that tell about life in what Alaskans call Southeast. Rain. Rain mixed with snow. Rotting ice and more rain.

Stories that tear your heart out like Dakotah, the story of their beloved lab who one day ran with them no more. And Clover, the rufous hummingbird that his wife Sherry, nursed back to health, released and just maybe met them in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico four months later.

And of course, bears and wolves. But the glacier wolf, a big black male they named Romeo, acted like no regular wolf. A pack animal but not part of a pack. Wolves are skittish of people and dogs, but he enjoyed their closeness and company on a daily basis. We will never know why this wolf chose to live as he did but gratefully, Nick Jans was there to see him, photograph him, and interact with him. Always careful to maintain the wolf’s wild integrity, Nick let him play with his dog while he took photos, then left him howling at the back fence when they went home.

Reading anything of Nick’s is a pleasure. His writing is close to the bone. You don’t even need to close your eyes to be there with him. GLACIER WOLf is like that.

Review by Jim Misko ISBN: 978-0-615-27870-4Hardback $22.95Arctic Images

Among Alaskan bush

pilots there is an old saying that the first person to an airplane crash is the pilot.

ALASKA WRITERS GUILDAlaska Author’s BooksBooks for all readers

for all occasions.Available at your favorite

BOOK STOREVol.I Issue 1 Serving the State of Alaska November 2010 - April 2011

One of the early dances in

Alaska was the “Hoochinoo Club Hop”

MARILYNFORRESTER

An adventurous woman’s frightful and humorous tales—the characters she met, life on the Trans-Alaska pipeline, and

teaching in Alaska Bush villages.

Marilyn Forrester arrived in Alaska in 1977 with a goal of striking it rich by being a welder on the Trans-Alaska Pipeline. With her traumatic divorce behind her, a new English degree, return airline ticket, and $200 in her pocket, she was ready for adventure. However, she didn’t do welding, but had unique and exciting adventures as she worked for Alyeska Pipeline Service Company in Anchorage, at Pump Station Five, and later at Prudhoe Bay. While working at Prudhoe Bay, she applied for a teaching position at Alaska Business College, and was immediately hired. Marilyn discovered she loved teaching and learning! After many humorous predicaments, she was hired at the Bush village of Napaskiak. As a teacher, Marilyn has a deep love for children that shines through in Teaching at the Top of the World. Sometimes Marilyn reflected, “And they are even paying me to do this job.” She became an advocate for her Special Education students. Her many adventures include being lost in a whiteout while walking home from school, showering without soap and drying with Kleenex, and golfing in the Nome Bering Sea Tournament. Teaching at the Top of the World chronicles the joys and hardships of living and teaching in remote Alaska. Perhaps she really did strike it rich—she affected the lives of hundreds of children.

Marilyn was one of the writers featured in Alaska Women Write, a collection of stories about adventurous Alaska women.

Teaching at the Top of the World

MA

RILYN

FOR

RESTER

Publication Consultants

$17.95ISBN 978-1-59433-162-6

Cover design by Sheri K Audette

TEACHING AT THETOP Of THE WORLD

by Marilyn Forrester

An adventurous woman’s frightful and humorous tales—the characters she met, life on the Trans-Alaska pipeline, working with Project Whales at the Barrow Naval Arctic Research Lab, and teaching in Alaska Bush villages.

Many Alaskans have a

memory of arriving in Alaska – they recall it right down to the tiniest of detail and retell the story with wistful look and an air of excitement. Author and retired teacher Marilyn Forrester does just this in her enjoyable memoir, TEACHING AT THE TOP Of THE WORLD.

Marilyn’s journey to Alaska began in January 1977 at age 40. She writes, “I departed the Lower Forty-Eight… I took $200, a return airline ticket, and enough dreams to fill another piece of luggage.” This sets the tone of Marilyn’s life in the 48th state. By the book’s conclusion, you feel Marilyn could probably fill several additional pieces of luggage with dreams and memories of her adventures.

Memories of the Alaska pipeline days are a colorful beginning to Marilyn’s memoirs. She recalls not only names and faces, but recounts the days of an Alaska where it was unusual for women to venture out and secure work beyond available secretarial positions.

From oil to education, Marilyn pursued her teaching degree. Marilyn quickly learned that teaching in rural Alaska was not contained within the four walls of a classroom. She became friend, Bingo hostess, slumber party chaperone, confidante, and transporter of china plates from Bethel to Napaskiak and back for a special pre-prom and graduation dinner of crab, shrimp and strawberry shortcake. Teaching took Marilyn not only to Napaskiak, but other rural sites including Barrow. Marilyn’s book is a true celebration of northern adventures and the spirit of women.

Reviewed byKersten ChristiansonISBN 978-1-59433-162-6softcover $17.95Publication Consultants

SAILING THE MAIL INALASkA. THE

MARITIME YEARS OfALASkAN

PHOTOGRAPHERJOHN E. THWAITES

by Pennelope GoForth

This is the engaging tale of a mail clerk with a camera on the famous little steamer, DORA. Together they survived the stormy Southwest Alaska waters from 1905 through 1912.

“Engines disabled, steering

gear useless, a heavy gale blowing, no fire to warm us, water all gone, and we away out here, a little bit of a disabled ship, all alone in the North Pacific Ocean, and it’s winter.”

Thus did John E. Thwaites, a mail clerk in the employ of the U.S. Postal Service in Alaska between 1905 and 1912, set apart the nature of his work environment from that of the comfortable pension seekers who deliver an endless cascade of junk mail to our mail boxes today.

Thwaites voyaged the coast of Alaska from Southeast to the Aleutian Islands as a seagoing mailman, enduring along the way the miserable, ice-coated, two month long drift referred to above, aboard the S.S. Dora; a month as a winter castaway after the wreck of the Dora’s replacement, and the earth shattering eruption of Katmai volcano in June, 1912.

Thwaites was also a prolific photographer, carrying with him a Kodak camera, creating thousands of unique photos. Anyone interested in the history of Alaska during the tumultuous explosion of prospecting, fish trapping, canneries, and fur hunting that occurred during the early 1900’s, and the rapid slide of Alaska’s indigenous cultures can be grateful to seasoned Alaskan journalist Pennelope Goforth, for gathering Thwaites’ work into a highly readable, thoroughly researched account of the photographer-mailman’s work.

Review by Lynn SchoolerISBN: 1892252007Softcover $24.95Cybrrcat Productions

fULLTIMING by Walter Grant

Honeybee was a mere kitten when she and her (human) parents became “Fulltimers” and set out on a twelve-year odyssey to discover their heritage. Honeybee recounts her life on the road.

Pussycat, Pussycat, where

did your travels take you, where did you roam?

fULLTIMING is the autobiography of a cat living on the road in a recreational vehicle with her (human) parents. Honeybee tells the story from her perspective as she experiences the unfamiliar as well as the unexpected. The times, places and events are real.

Curiosity lands Honeybee in many awkward and often life-threatening situations. She survives by keeping her wits about her—occasionally she requires the assistance of her parents. Honeybee is torn between her desire for total freedom and the realization she will never leave her parents.

Honeybee tells her story from the grave as she takes you from kitten hood to a glimpse of the life beyond, from the bold and daring days of her youth to the autumn years when watching life pass by her window and reminiscing was enough. Dreams, visions perhaps, of the ancient past haunt Honeybee for the greater part of her life and near the end she has difficulty distinguishing between dreams and reality.

Honeybee travels half a million miles as she crisscrosses North America, from Coronado, California, where she was born, to Moosonee, Ontario and from Key West to Alaska—a new adventure awaits her at each stop along the way. Life on the road wasn’t always easy or free of danger, but it was always exciting.

In my humble opinion, fULLTIMING is the best book ever written by a cat. Perhaps the best book by a nonhuman since Grendel.

Review by Judy BeaversISBN 1-59433-018-2Softcover $14.95

Annie finds herself in a difficult and unusual situation.   Her sister Louise is missing, taken by invisible creatures with hissing voices!  Her parents do nothing, seeming not to care at all.  A magical horse, called Red Mare, learns of the sister’s abduction.  Realizing this is the horse’s final act of fulfilling prophecy, she takes Annie into her world.   A place where vines are alive and the enemies are shadows...

Katie Halley has loved writing since she was eight years old and wrote Running Red when she was twelve. Katie lives in Alaska with her parents and pets and is a high school freshman.

Cover art by TessemaCover by Swanky Designs, LLC

ISBN: 978-1-59433-158-9 $12.95

RunningRedCover.indd 1 10/7/10 6:48 AMRUNNING RED by Katie Halley:

Annie finds herself in a difficult and unusual situation. Her sister Louise is missing, taken by invisible creatures with hissing voices! Her parents do nothing, seeming not to care at all. A magical horse, called Red Mare, learns of the sister’s abduction. Realizing this is the horse’s final act of fulfilling prophecy, she takes Annie into her world. A place where vines are alive and the enemies are shadows…….

RUNNING RED is a rip-

snorting adventure story of a tumultuous series of life tests for many very lovable characters, both human and not. Of course, characters become even more lovable as they are attacked by malevolent beings who, coming one wave after another, want to end the quest of our heroes, indeed to end their very lives. If you love horses, benevolent wolves and mountain lions and especially incredibly strong little girls on a mission to save a nameless, but fascinating nether-world, RUNNING RED is a must read.

The heroine is an eight-turning-nine girl named Annie, whose five-turning six sister, Louise, has been kidnapped by the very evil Shadow Army called Toblins. They take intended-sacrifice Louise from her home on Earth in order to fulfill their ancient prophesy of subjugating their entire world. Only Annie and her newest best friend, Red Mare—a magical red horse—can save Louise and the nether-world. As Annie and Louise are so young, some readers in their teens may find their exploits on the edge of credible, although as an adult, I did not.

Having suspended reality - I am a writer of non-fiction - I found RUNNING RED a fascinating read that I couldn’t put down. As a talented 12-year old author, Katie Halley has a real way with words. May she not stop here.

Review by Harvard AyersISBN: 9781594331589Softcover $12.95Publication Consultants

HEARTBROkE BAY by Lynn d’Urso

Greed, Lust, Arrogance, and Murder - It’s a love story, based on an event that took place during the terrible winter of 1898. A beautiful young English woman is marooned on the coast of Alaska with her husband and three fellow prospectors, romance and psychological decay follow.

A loosely fact-based his-

torical and literary novel set in Alaska in the last years of the 19th century, HEART-BROkE BAY is the story of five gold seekers, told from the viewpoint of the only woman in the group, Hannah Butler Nelson of Bristol, England.

When the miners meet with hardship, adversity, and disap-pointment, and at one point ex-hilarating success, each mem-ber starkly reveals himself, as does Hannah. Her husband is Hans, a poser, but practical, tough, and willing to work hard for his obsession with riches. “Dutch” is fairly harm-less and gentle, but deceitful and manipulative. There is gi-ant Texan “Harky,” a tortured soul of great goodness gone somewhat astray, ambivalent in his dreams, a plodder. Mi-chael, romantic, sensitive, ad-venturous, hard and gentle, remains an enigma, his actions left to the reader to interpret. Their interaction with shaman Negook illustrates a contrast in life experience and views that makes it impossible for each to understand the other›s cultur-ally determined behavior and lifestyle.

Written in period style, HEARTBROkE BAY is rich in detail and description, exqui-site of language. It poignantly outlines Hannah’s soul-ripping choices, her joys, her disillu-sionment, her deprivation, and the ultimate fate of her dreams. In adversity she grows, even hardens.

Author Lynn d›Urso has taken the bones of the story as unearthed through old records and newspaper articles, and put together first a skeleton of the events, then a live, fleshed-out, full-blooded portrait of five poorly prepared and some-what naive adventurers facing the larger-than-life challenge, tragedy, and suffering imposed by the unforgiving Alaska wil-derness.

Review by Marthy Johnson ISBN: 9780425236802 Softcover $15.00 Penguin

A classic tale of pilot be-

ing “lifted” after a landing comes from the life of Bob Reeve. Reeve once landed on a field outside of Daw-son, Yukon Territory, and sent a team of two horses pounding into a barn in fright. As he was help-ing the farmer extricate the horses from the tangle of rope and harness, the horse that had fallen on the ground kicked the horse that was standing. And the horse that was standing kicked Reeve sending him flying “a good 20 feet.”

John Cross once asked Gillam how he dressed to stay warm in an open cock-pit. Gillam replied that “you don’t dress to stay warm. You dress to keep from freezing to death.” [Cross Tape, 1963].

PO

EM

S BY

A C

OU

NT

RY

GIR

LE

velyn J. Satterfi eld-Johnson

Now when I hear the call of a lonely wolf,In the Land of the Midnight Sun;

There may be a thousand wolves calling....But all I’ll ever hear ~ is just one!

~~”The Last Call”

This is the fi rst collection of poem stories assimilated and written by Evelyn J. Satterfi eld - Johnson. As stated in

the Preface, Evelyn has written short stories and song lyrics too! Evelyn’s lyrics were published by different artists on Hilltop Records. Evelyn is a true long-time Alaskan and has been a friend of my family for a very long time.

Evelyn came to me one day and said, “All these will die with me! It’ll be like I never wrote them! Brenda, can you do something with these?” “Absolutely! I said. “I’ll even do better than that. My passion has always been writing and editing. I will publish your collection”....and that’s how this all began!

$12.95 USA

Visit us on the web!www.agatorpublishing.com

P O E M S B Y A

C O U N T R YG I R L

Evelyn J. Satterfi eld-Johnson

a-gator cover.indd 1 12/28/09 11:21 AM

POEMS BY ACOUNTRY GIRL

by Evelyn J Satterfield-Johnson

A book-length selection of Alaska-oriented poems.

Poetry, by its very nature,

is subjective. This makes any review of a book of poetry difficult, particularly for a tabloid that includes fiction, nonfiction, fantasy and science fiction. That being said, POEMS BY A COUNTRY GIRL is a good fit into the tabloid because it is a collection of snap shots of Alaskan life through a different lens. It is a mixing of the hard times of the northland along with the proverbial: the wolf who fights to become the leader of the pack, the old miner named Russ who would sit in the bar and cuss, and the outhouse that was built too close the river’s edge and one day it just floated away.

The book itself is broken into two parts, the first being the literary look at what would best be described as homestead Alaska, the views of woman in a cabin that is remote enough from civilization to give a feel for the Alaska we all know exists but few of us actually see – and fewer of us still live. It is the Alaska where the homesteader gives the moose names, bears meander about the cabin, ravens fly overhead and the nearest neighbor is a ‘a good piece’ up the river – and he’s known as the “lone trapper.”

The second half of the book is a mixture of patriotic, religious and grandmotherly poems. It is a balance of the first half, kind of a grandmother when she was young start of the work and then a grandmother as she is now at the back of the book. The book is long for a work of poetry, or, rather, a collection of poems. It is 148 pages in length and in those pages there is something for everyone, young or old, grandmother or granddaughter – or even the lone trapper who lives down the river.

Review by Steven C. Levi Published by: A-GatorPublishing - AlaskaISBN: 9780615343891Soft cover $12.95

Arthur A. Dietz, who would later lead a group of 18 Argonauts across the Malaysian Glacier, trained his dog team in “upper New York City.” Several of men were arrested because a po-liceman thought they had become “unbalanced by the gold craze stories in the papers.” The policeman eventually turned the men and dogs over to the hu-mane society on a charge of “cruelty to animals.” His-tory, replete with irony, did not neglect Dietz. In 1898 he left with 18 men. When he returned, only four were left alive, two blind, and they had eaten every dog to survive.

Arriving in Valdez in 1898, W. R. Abercrom-bie encountered what was left of the disastrous stam-pede over the Valdez Gla-cier. Hundreds were still stranded on the ice field and dying of hunger in the Copper River Valley while the lucky few who made it out were living in decrepit mining shelters “packed like sardines in a box.” De-ciding that “70 percent [of the derelict miners] were mentally deranged,” Aber-crombie reported that one Swede had talked about a “glacial demon” which had attacked he and son twice. During the second attack, the boy was strangled to death. “When I heard this story there were some ten or twelve other me in the cabin,” Abercrombie wrote, “and at that time, it would not have been safe to dispute the theory of the existence of this demon on the Valdez Glacier, as every man in there firmly believed it to be a reality.”

ARCTIC GARDENS –VOICES fROM ANABUNDANT LAND

by Harvard Ayers, Landon Pennington and Dave Harman

Meet the people most af-

fected by petroleum devel-opment and climate change in North America. The Gwich’in Indians, the Inu-piat Eskimos and the Inuvi-aluit of the Alaskan and Ca-nadian Arctic speak out.

ARCTIC GARDENS isn’t

about gardening at all. Instead, it’s a cutting-edge collection of personal narratives revolving around the central themes of climate change and related cultural impacts in the modern Arctic. The speakers, mostly Athabaskan, Inupiat, and Inuvialuit Natives, are eyewitnesses to the rapid changes that are sweeping across western arctic Canada and northern Alaska—the fastest-warming region on earth. These changes and their consequences are cast in stark, matter-of-fact detail by people who have no stake in modern science, politics, or grant writing. They are simply reporting the alarmingly rapid transformations of climate they and their peoples have witnessed over the past several decades, and the direct, often devastating impacts they have wrought on their subsistence-based, centuries-old lifestyles.

This 256-page large-format perfect-bound work, complete with black-and-white images that complement the well-edited and arranged text, is a must-read for climate change nay-sayers and subscribers alike—though it unapologetically supports the viewpoint that the roots of global warming are anthropogenic (human-caused), and are directly tied to reliance on fossil fuels. This informative, unvarnished, and fascinating volume deserves a place in any library that focuses on modern Native/aboriginal issues, and poses thought-provoking issues in the eloquently simple language of the common man.

Review by Nick Jans ISBN 978-0-9843947-1-5 Softcover $21.95Arctic Voices

BREAk POINT DOWNby Marty Johnson

Kitt Buchanan is young, rich, a champion athlete at the top of his sport, and life is training, travel, and triumph. Talk shows, interviews, magazine articles, fan clubs. Unlimited bank accounts. Can he not be a self-indulgent jerk? And what happens when he loses it all? Now the skills that made him a champion must make him a man.

BREAkPOINT DOWN

is one of those rare books where you are actually pulling for the protagonist to get his comeuppance. In the vernacular of the street, Kitt Buchanan is a “real piece of work.” Obnoxious, self-centered, arrogant and exactly the kind of a person you would never want to be, he slides through life on his talent. He feels his is ‘owed’ just because, well, just because he is Kitt Buchanan.

However, when he runs out of his 15 minutes of fame, his entire life falls apart. Now, to survive, he has to treat life as a sport, so to speak, and reach inside himself to find the energy to succeed. Success, in this case, means becoming a real human being, not the two-dimensional arrogant twit he once was.

I liked this book for three reasons. First, it is a fine character study of the downside of fame and fortune. Too many athletes, actors, painters, politicians feel that they are blessed and all they have to do is stay alive and good fortune will come their way. Well, it will. For 15 minutes. And then you are on your own. This book shows that. Second, it is well written and that makes the reading enjoyable. Thirdly, you feel as though these are real people, not character pulled from the author’s imagination.

Reviewed by Steven C. Levi ISBN 9781`594331114 softcover $17.95 Publication Consultants

WRITE & WRONGby Marthy Johnson

This is a grammar book for all those writers who don’t think they need one. [They are in error.]

Being a writer, I hate rules.

I mean, after all, that’s why I became a writer. So I would not have to follow any rules. But, as they say, that’s neither here nor there when it comes to writing because if the reader cannot understand what it is you are saying then the writing is wasted.

And that is one of the three reasons I liked WRITE & WRONG. If I can’t ‘get the grammar right,’ how can I expect the reader to follow my train of thought? The second reason I like WRITE & WRONG is because of its size. Yes, I know that’s a sin but it’s true. Not only did I read the book – dull, dry, boring but unbelievably necessary for every writer – but I keep in my bathroom for those, um, moments when I should be doing something productive. The third reason that every writer should have a copy of WRITE & WRONG is because YOU are nowhere near as smart as you think you are!

Review by Steven C. LeviISBN 1888125675 Softcover $19.95Publication Consultants

For years, a spring ritual

in Fairbanks was to watch the Turner Street Bridge, a wooden structure, be pum-meled to splinters by the tons of ice coursing down the Chena River. During the summer, debris would collect on the bridge and once, in 1905, it created a dam that flooded the city. The Turner Bridge was de-molished in 1917 to make way for a steel structure which was, in turn, de-molished in 1959 for the concrete bridge which still stands.

Tony Schultz, who spent

ore than forty years fly-ing the bush, was famous for his rescue missions as well as his willingness to fly corpses and convicts. In the 1960s he was chartered by the United States Mar-shal to pick up a man who was accused of killing his wife. Upon arrival in the village of Chevak, Schultz discovered that there was a witness to fly back to Fair-banks as well. The plane he was flying only had four seats and the corpse of the wife was coming back as well. Schultz, a veteran at hauling cargo in the bush solved the problem easily. He seated the witness on the husband’s lap and strapped them both into a back seat with seatbelt.

Most miners lived on

a staple diet of “Alaskan strawberries,” better known as beans.

COWBOYS Of THE SkYby Steven C. Levi

A nonfiction look at Alaska’s bush pilots who lived the adage that there are old pilots and bold pilots but no old, bold pilots.

Grade 6 Up? A delightful

nonfiction romp. Nowhere else will you find Alaskan aeronautical anecdotes related with such humor for an adolescent audience. From Harold “Thrill ‘Em, Chill ‘Em, Spill ‘Em, But No Kill ‘Em” Gillam to Archie Ferguson, “The Craziest Pilot in the World,” the author describes in colorful, humorous detail the daredevil lives of the early pilots who braved the elements and distance to service remote villages in the vast Alaskan “bush.”

Going by decades from the 1920s to the present, the history of the heyday of Alaskan aviation comes alive. The exploits of the daring “Sky Cowboys” glorify a vanishing breed, now considerably tamed by FAA regulations; however, Levi does not glorify the pilots to the point of deification. He notes the old Alaskan adage, “There are old pilots and bold pilots, but there are no old, bold pilots.” Numerous historical black-and-white photographs illustrate the text.

Review by Mollie BynumISBN 0802783325Publication Consultants12.95

DERELICTS,SCOUNDRELS,

BUMMERS AND DOVESby Steven C. Levi

This is humorous collec-tion of short stories of the derelicts, scoundrels, bum-mers and doves who were left in Alaska after the Alas-ka Gold Rush, circa 1903.

DERELICTS,

SCOUNDRELS, BUMMERS AND DOVES is a unique look at small town Alaska immediately after the Alaska Gold Rush. Everyone who could get out of Alaska after gold played out left. Those who had not made a dime on the rush were stuck in the North and had to scramble to make a living.

This is an excellent read, a mixture of history and litera-ture presented in a humorous fashion. The characters in this book are so real because they are just like similar Alaskans today. Or Americans. Which is the apparent theme of the book: times may change but humans do not. We are doing the same things now and were done af-ter the Alaska Gold Rush. The only difference is that we use our real names today. In those days there were Seal Face George, Pork Belly Pender-gast, Peg Leg O’Banion, Blind Man Kremen, Johnny the Jinx and Three-Fingered Willy. The events included scams, drunk-ards, claim jumping, bait-and-switch, practical jokes, thiev-ery, good deeds, soiled doves and lessons learned. The thread that links all of the sto-ries, in addition to the fact that they take place in four small communities within a few days travel of each other, is that ‘what goes around comes around.’

DERELICTS, SCOUNDRELS, BUMMERS AND DOVES is an excellent read and offers a unique look at small town Alaska in 1903, an era that is long gone and will never come again. But the glimpse into the human soul is forever.

Review by Danny DanielsISBN 1934841706Paperback Zumaya $14.99

ALIMAR’S QUESTby Mark and Josie

McKinney

This is a Fantasy Trilogy that takes place in the King-dom of Asteria. Book I was released in June 2010. Book II is due out in December of 2010 and Book III will be released in May 2011.

BOOk IThe Kingdom of Aste-

ria is filled with fantastical creatures and races of all types. Alimar, a human boy of fourteen, has led a shel-tered life and hasn’t seen any of the kingdom he lives in. The only excitement he has ever had was in his re-occurring dream of an epic battle. He wakes one morn-ing and finds that the dream was real and he must set out on the quest of a lifetime.

BOOk II Five companions are now

only three, can they complete the quest? Alimar is now fifteen and has survived his quest with the help of friends he has met along the way. Two of his companions are missing and he must continue on without them. Alimar, Griff, and Dorn must solve new mysteries and face more fantastical creatures. They discover a hidden race of people that make the ocean their home, a hidden mountain city, and they are in more danger than ever before.

Perhaps the toughest of all

books to write is the fantasy. Not only is it a genre unto itself, it has every element of failure ever present. With science fiction the science has to meld with the fiction. With a mystery, the entire story must be revealed in the end and no end left loose. The gal must get the guy in romance writing and in general fiction the story must leave the reader satisfied that all characters ‘got what they deserved.’

Then there is fantasy. Not only do every one of the above requirements have to be met, the author must create a universe that is believable and, at the same time, unbelievable. Then it gets more difficult, the universe of the novel must have

human characters in a fantasy setting or fantasy creatures in a sort of, somewhat, kind of human setting. The movie STARGATE is a good example of the former, the saga of a team of modern day soldiers being transported to a civilization in some other dimension. The hobbit trilogy worked because readers had no preconception of what a hobbit was, what a hobbit did or how a hobbit thought. Then J. R. R. Tolquin’s Lord of the Rings proceeded to create a universe where little was humanly normal but to do so it took thousands and thousands of pages. [And was Gollum human or hobbit or what?]

When Mark and Josie McKinney wrote ALIMAR’S QUEST their task was made more difficult because they were centering their books on a 14-year old human. This made the writing doubly difficult because now there was the ongoing maturing of the protagonist along with all of the troubles and tribulations of the quest itself.

I enjoyed ALIMAR’S QUEST even though I am not a fantasy reader. I found the characters believable and the quest reasonable. The writing was well done and carried the story. Alimar was, on one hand, what I expected of a 14-year old but, on the other hand, I was taken by surprise as I read the work. This would be a good series for a junior high or high school students and also serve a grandparent well who wanted to read something fantastic to an elementary school grandchild – kind of a bonding through literature. I’d rank the series as an A.

Reviewed by Steven C. LeviASIN B003WEAC72Kindle Book 12.99www.alimarsquest.com

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marksSPINE SIZE 0.3125 (24-80 pages) 80665-MERC_Portrait_Hardcover

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Huga Huga HippoAuthor: Brenda C Merchant

In Asia, the Hippo Brown family lived amongst other animals in

a place they called Rivers’ Pond. Hug Brown, a shy hippo and

two years younger than his teenage sister Holly, developed respect

and cleanliness diffi culties. Rivers’ Pond avoided and outcast him

because of it. In a shameful state, Hug had to fi nd a way to get back

respect and undo the humiliation he caused his family. Eepock, an

old grouchy crocodile, appointed himself protector of the children

and never admitted to having a softer side. Danger lurked at

Kingdom Falls. Zepher, a big evil tiger and other large cats hunted

there and always were on the lookout for their next victim. During

a big thunderstorm, excitement escalated when Mrs. Brown is hurt,

Zepher ordered his evil plan carried out and, Hug Brown became

heroic and gained a very uncommon alliance and friend, old Eepock

the Croc.

by Brenda C. Merchantby

HUGA HUGA HIPPOby Brenda C Merchant

It would be easy to say that HUGA HUGA HIPPO is just another one of those youth-onquest where the youngster is in the form of an animal in a fairy tale. Half of the last sentence is true. But what makes this book a worthy read is that it was designed as a book that would be read by a parent and child at the same time. The artwork is excellent and carries the story along and keeps the young reader from getting lost in the story line. This is not a book of oversized type and bright pictures that takes a child a few moments to get through. It is a book of merit that takes time to read. Overall this is a good read. It is a book that a child would enjoy as much for the adventure and fantasy as the artwork. It is a timeless book in the sense that it can be read over and over and the reader will still find a something new. The artwork is of high quality and not ‘just stuck in’ because a children’s book needs artwork. The writing is of high quality as well. In summation, the book was so good I am sending it to my niece!

Review by Steven C. Levi0984502300Softcover $26.00A-Gator Publishing9780984502301 Hardcover $26.00

Order through atlasbooks.com

At the Arctic Brother-

hood Christmas Eve Smok-er in 1908 in Cleary, Miss Riley and her partner won the booby prize for dancing. Her prize, the Fairbanks Daily Times reported, was “a pair of gentlemen’s rub-ber boots, [and] she is look-ing for someone whose size will fill their vacant depths.”

fOR WHAT HECOULD BECOME

by James Misko

Unable to survive village life after WWII, Bill Williams finds living in the big city a challenge and succumbs to alcoholism. The chance for a new life drags him from the alleys and onto an Iditarod sled which will define the man he will become.

I read many books and it is

not often that I say “WOW”, but this book is one of them. For What He Could Become chronicles Bill William’s life. It has four very distinct acts.

In Act 1 Bill, a 17 year old Athabascan Indian is living in a small Alaska community. He feels suppressed and depressed by his peers and the elders. He escapes from the confines of the village. A 90 mile walk gets him to the Yukon River where he becomes part of the workforce building the AlCan Highway.

In Act 2 we see Bill involved in World War II, although his active participation is short, it shows he has the ability to succeed and lead people. He uses his native knowledge to show others how to survive in a harsh environment.

In Act 3 Bill returns to his village in triumph, only to discover that his brother has stolen his childhood sweetheart. In despair Bill heads to the big city to seek anonymity amongst the masses. Two unfortunate and unrelated incidents occur and Bill finds himself penniless and homeless. This once proud young man slowly falls into the long middle age of the homeless pan handler.

To find out about Act 4, you will have to read the book!

This is a superbly written piece of literature. Mr. Misko has done a great job both in research and execution. I cannot recommend this book strongly enough.

Review by Simon Barrett ISBN: 0-9640826-1-6Softcover $16.95

“TRAILBREAKERS beautifully captures and chronicles the hopes,dreams, uncertainties and the raw adventure and sheer audacity ofthat first great race. Only someone like Rod Perry, who lived it, couldtell this story—and Rod is a story teller like no one else. His insightsare fresh, but they benefit from the vantage point of his four-decade-long overview. This is the book we’ve been waiting for! Thanks, Rod!”

— John K. Norman, Trustee, Iditarod Race Foundation and Attorney for the Iditarod Trail Committee, 1973-1986

“Rod’s got his facts down. Dad would be proud of this book.”

— Joee and Raymie Redington, sons of the late Joe Redington Sr., “Father of the Iditarod”

“It’s about time someone wrote it this way! If you are jolted when partsof this story differ from commonly accepted renditions, you may besure that Rod’s version is accurate. Unlike most other writers, he wasthere close to us. From his experiential, insider’s viewpoint, Rod writesabout how The Last Great Race® was begun as it should be: carefullyresearched and artfully, factually—and humorously—described.”

— Gleo Huyck, Co Founder, Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race

Visit the author at www.rodperry.com

Design and Layout:Sundog Media, Anchorage, Alaska www.sundogmedia.com

Cover: Daniel Quick

US $19.95

PIONEERING ALASKA’S IDITARODPIONEERING ALASKA’S IDITARODPIONEERING ALASKA’S IDITARODPIONEERING ALASKA’S IDITAROD

by Rod Perryby Rod Perry

The Most DaringIditarod Adventure of All Time

Founding The Last Great Race On Earth

The Most DaringIditarod Adventure of All Time

Founding The Last Great Race On Earth

The Most DaringIditarod Adventure of All Time

Founding The Last Great Race On Earth®

THE MOST EXPENSIVEMISTRESS IN

JEffERSON COUNTYby Jim Misko

Hawk Neilson faces ruin if he doesn’t close a $400 million exchange that involves Indian tribes, banks, 135 ranchers, and the US Government. It must close by Friday and everything is going wrong so far on Monday.

Perhaps the best expression

to use to describe the first three-quarters of THE MOST EXPENSIVE MISTRESS IN JEffERSON COUNTY is “just when you thought things could not get worse they did.” The action centers on Hawkins Neilson who has gambled more than everything on the biggest land deal of his life, $400 million. Not only has he put himself up to his eyebrows in debt to move the deal along but he being battered by cash flow problems because of a ne’r-do-well son who, at the same time, is vying with the estranged wife of an ex-convict turned Native activist -- who is mucking up Hawkson’s deal. Then the IRS shows up for a personal audit.

THE MOST EXPENSIVE MISTRESS IN JEffERSON COUNTY is an uncomfortable read if you are looking for a book with a sweet, straight story line. But it is a great book if you want to see the inside mechanism of how BIG deals probably do go down. Hawkins is on a fiscal griddle and chapter-by-chapter he is forced to jiggle hundreds of thousands of dollars from account to account to cover bad debts, cash flow shortfalls and credit squeezes that threaten to ruin him before he can pull off the deal of the century. It is an agonizing slice of life of a man who is going to go from financial ruin to being a multimillionaire in a matter of days - if and only if he can keep the financial wolves from the door. If you want to know what it takes to be a big boy, this is the book to read. See more at www.jimmisko.com

Review by Steve Levi ISBN#: 9-780964082625Softcover $15.95178 pages

HOW TO fINANCE ANYREAL ESTATE ANYPLACE ANY TIME

by Jim Misko.

Forty-five (45) outside of the box methods for financing any real estate transaction. Written in layman’s language it also includes a definition of each technique, the strategy to employ and a completed transaction using it.

This book should be titled

“How to make deals come together when everyone else said it couldn’t be done”. I have been in real estate for 23 years and Jim’s book is now the touchstone reference that I go to whenever I find myself in a place where the typical conventional solutions won’t solve my problem.

Professionally, I have made a lot of money from Jim’s “outside-the-box” thinking. If you are in the practice of real estate and are sincerely committed to solving your client’s problems, then this book should be the dog-eared standard by which you do your business. If you own real estate, this book explains in layman’s language how to get to your end game goals. The concepts are easy to understand and have been tried and proven successful by Jim and hundreds of professionals around the world.

On a personal note, just two of Jim’s suggestions (how to put the equity in your home to work and how to use real estate for your IRA, SEP and 401(k) accounts) have made me a bundle. This book gives you real life examples on how to tap into the resources that we all have available to us.

The question is - are you ready to start making money? If so, buy Jim’s book and let me know how it turns out for you.

Review by Robert Martin ISBN-0-7570-0135-1 $17.95

TRAILBREAkERS II,PIONEERING

ALASkA’S IDITAROD by Rod Perry

Race sled dogs 1,000 miles across Alaska? Impos-sible. Desperate to prove them wrong, organizers, val-iant drivers and magnificent dogs plunge into The Most Daring Iditarod Adventure of All Time. Trailblazing musher Rod Perry writes the most in-depth story ever told of that wild, crazy, odyssey that founded the great race.

Just a dream—an incredible

dream that Joe Redington had about racing 1,000 miles with teams of sled dogs from Anchorage to Nome, Alaska. But for a few years leading up to the first full 1,000 mile race, mushers were coming out and joining up to give it a try and in 1973 somebody yelled “Go”, and they were off. Rod Perry, a young inexperienced dog driver, was among them.

This is his second book based on the Iditarod Trail. Book I leads the reader down the early trails forged out in Alaska to get to the gold fields and merchants and road house operators that supplied them. Now you get the rest of the story.

Broken into four sections, Perry deftly fills in the blanks with a section on the prelude to the race. The scrambling and complaining and hard knocks Redington gave and got as he promised a big prize for the winner. And that he backed the loan of the funds with his homestead. That’s betting the farm on your dream.

Section 2 covers the actual race and the problems and breathtaking experiences that hit every driver and dog on the trail.

Section 3 brings you back down after the race. The release of tension and deprivation of sleep and the empty stomach. It’s over and the reader has been with them for almost a month. Section 4 is full of insider information, history, and the future of the race. A healthy diet of good stuff.

Review by Jim Misko ISBN: 978-0-9823730-1-9 Softcover $19.95Rod Perry

MEET MR. NAPkINby Krista Peterson

Matthew’s mom has a secret. He reluctantly befriends Strange Sarah and together they uncover the mystery behind Matthew’s magical mother.

MEET MR. NAPkIN is

a charming narrative ideally suited for the preschooler or kindergartner. The author obviously has a great deal of experience with children in this age group, and knows how they learn. She conveys several good messages in an appealing fashion to those just beginning to learn important social skills. The most obvious lesson is learning about the use of a napkin. Less obvious, but more important, is recognizing the value of those labeled as different. The story is just right for the attention span of youngsters transitioning from the age of magical thinking.

The reader may be somewhat unsure of the transition in which the unraveling of the mystery occurs, but it will be of no consequence in the unfolding of the story and its intended message. The questions at the end of the story will be very useful to the parent in reinforcing the positive messages learned in this whimsical book. The crayon and colored pencil illustrations, by Michael Brown, will have strong appeal for the intended age group. The bright use of color, and the Manga inspired eyes, will capture the attention and draw the reader into the story. Parents, or teachers reading this story to the class, just might get the urge to draw happy faces on their children’s napkins!

Review by KathrynHalley ISBN: 1594331008 Softcover $12.95Publication Consultants

During the bombing of

Kiska and Attu during the Aleutain Campaign, Colo-nel William O. Earecksen stated that the high altitude bombing was as effective as “trying to kill ants with a pogo stick.” The pilots solved this problem by com-ing in low, as low as 75 feet, which increased their hit ratio.

NATIONAL WILDLIfEREfUGES Of ALASkA

by Elaine Rhode

Come eye-to-eye with walrus, polar bears, and salmon in this richly illustrated look into the heart of Alaska’s 16 national wildlife refuges, guardians of these and other wild wonders.

NATIONAL WILDLIfE

REfUGES Of ALASkA is an excellent dissertation on the refuges. Most of the publications and books I have read on wildlife refuges and parks tend to be somewhat technical and sterile in their delivery. They present the facts, give some scientific names and provide a few pictures. Elaine Rhode, on the other hand, writes in a very dynamic prose that keeps your interest. It is a style you might expect when reading a mystery or adventure novel. It makes for a much more enjoyable read.

It would be possible to write a book on each of the refuges and in fact most of them have had books written about them. The challenge for the author was to condense all this information into a relatively short article for each refuge. I think she did an excellent job in accomplishing that task. Each of our refuges are very different. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge has very little in common with the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge in regard to geography, climate and wildlife. Rhode points out the unique features of each refuge so the reader can easily see what is special about each of them and does so in a very precise and efficient manner. The pictures are well done and serve their purpose of backing up the text.

Overall I think Elaine Rhode has done a fine job of presenting these refuges to the reader in an entertaining and informative book.

Review by Bob Bell ISBN 0930931556Softcover $9.95

TILLY’S SONGby Carol Welty Roper

This is the saga of a German immigrant coming to America before the Second World War. Intertwined in the story is the changing of America in this turbulent time.

One of the most overplayed

theatrical episodes in American movies is the immigrant coming to America. The problem is that movies make it look so easy. The streets look so clean. The immigrants look so destined for success. Then the movie ends after 120 minutes and everyone goes home feeling proud to have had grandparents who came from the old country.

The reality is quite a bit different and books like TILLY’S SONG make that clear. Just getting to America was a challenge. Then there was the language barrier and, as Europe slipped towards war, there was an ethnic barrier as well. Germans in particular were looked upon then as Arabs are today. They were just not ‘good enough’ to be Americans in spite of the fact that they came on the same boats with the Irish and Italians and Spanish and Portuguese immigrants.

This is a superb book for looking at the underbelly of what it took – and takes – to be an American. It is no walk in the park and it is far too easy for many of us, even those with European roots, to gloss over the hardships that come from trying to leap from one continent to another let alone from one culture to another. But that’s the story of America and the backdrop of TILLY”S SONG. For this reviewer the most telling line in the book was on page 112: Mathilda had observed that Mattie Johnson was a German who spoke English with an Irish accent and looked like she was French.” That was America then; that’s America now.

Reviewed bySteven C. LeviISBN 9781934635476 $14.95 softcover.

fEATHER fROMA STRANGER

by Marianne Schlegelmilch

The travels of young widow Mara Edwards on the Alaska State Ferry and to her unexpected Alaska destinations, places and mystique with heart wrenching, heart warming adventure

“Your present is the future

of your past. You will need this to protect your future from your past. All who come here seek the future of their past” is the message conveyed to Mara Edwards by a mysterious elder named Joe who gifts her with a feather while aboard the M.V. Malaspina. This is the beginning of spirited Mara’s journey north, a journey embroiled in mystery, adventure and profound relationships with both people and place.

fEATHER fROM A STRANGER by Alaskan author Marianne Schlegelmilch is a story woven through the various landscapes of the Inside Passage on the Alaska Marine Highway, up the Alcan to the Mat-Su Valley, on to the Homer Spit on the Kenai Peninsula. Still grieving the husband she lost four years earlier, Mara follows her inner compass north, hoping for a new start through a research biologist position near Homer. Mara encounters intrigue where the Alaskan landscape both hides and reveals the truths of past and present. It is Joe who bridges the span of time offering Mara a mysterious message that revisits her in various settings throughout the novel: on the ferry, at a brutal and complex crime scene, and later at a ceremonial gathering on an unnamed beach in Southeast Alaska where that tricky feather performs one last act.

An enjoyable read and a welcome addition to the ever-expanding canon of the Alaskan mystery genre, Schlegelmilch offers readers a generous slice of Alaska through this novel.

Review byKersten ChristiansonISBN 9781594331282 Publication Consultants softcover $15.95.

WALkING HOMEby Lynn Schooler

In the spring of 2007, hard on the heels of the worst winter in the history of Juneau, Alaska, Lynn Schooler finds himself facing the far side of middle age and exhausted by laboring to handcraft a home as his marriage slips away. Seeking solace and escape in nature, he sets out on a solo journey into the Alaskan wilderness, traveling first by small boat across the formidable Gulf of Alaska, then on foot along one of the wildest coastlines in North America.

My reading time is the last

two hours of the day, in bed, propped up by three pillows, the light over my shoulder, the book sitting on my chest. Little in this life is as rewarding as crawling into bed with a smile and the delectable inner feeling of looking forward to a good book. WALkING HOME written, or should I say, crafted by Lynn Schooler, filled me with that anticipation, joy, warmness, and reward like few books do.

It is a personal epic—a memoir. Reading it you feel like you have filleted the author to his soul and looked inside his most personal thoughts. More then if he had said them to you in person and you looked him in the eyes as he said it.

From building his house to the loss of romance in his marriage to the foot walk across some of the most inhospitable country in Alaska you live very close to his heart. You see through his eyes and feel through his soul and it doesn’t get any better than that.

He uses the right words to convey to the reader what it is like to be alone in the Alaska wilderness, a ruined and determined bear on your trail, driving a small boat into smashing waves, and losing a wife he had hoped to return to. It entertains, educates, and inspires.

WALkING HOME is at the top of my list for 2010 reading.

Reviewed by Jim MiskoISBN 1596916737 softcover $17.50

HEARTS Of COURAGEby John Tippets

This is a fascinating account of Dad’s experiences as a passenger and a 29 day survivor of the Gillam crash in SE Alaska in January, 1943.

On January 5, 1943, famed

Alaska bush pilot Harold Gillam left Seattle, WA, on a flight to Alaska. The plane crashed in the Alaska wilderness about 30 miles from his intended refueling stop at Annette Island. Gillam and his five passengers all survived the crash. Four of the six persons survived 29 days in the wilderness before being rescued. Hearts of Courage was written by the son of one of those passengers, Joe Tippets. This is a survival story that is truly amazing.

About 25 years ago, the State of Alaska Department of Public Safety made a series of seven videotapes about wilderness survival. The first six tapes concerned the nuts and bolts of survival—how to make a fire, how to keep warm and dry, how to make shelter, etc. Videotape seven was about the mental part of survival—having faith, courage, perseverance, a positive outlook, and determination to keep going when all seems hopeless.

HEARTS Of COURAGE is definitely the “videotape seven” of outdoor survival stories. The faith and courage displayed by Joe Tippets and his wife Alta (who waited for him in their Anchorage, Alaska home) is heartwarming and inspiring beyond belief. If you like aviation yarns, Alaska aviation history, northern winter wilderness survival stories, or true stories of continuing faith in the face of utmost adversity, this is the book you need to read.

Review by John TippetsISBN 1594330778Publication Consultantssoftcover $15.56

In the early days of Fair-

banks there was a miner from White River whose feet were frostbitten so badly they had to be amputated at the instep. He had a pair of bear’s feet made into moc-casins so he could use the bear’s claws as toes.

EL GANCHOby Mike Travis

Prudenciano Nava botch-es a train holdup, eludes an Apache bounty hunter, and runs guns for Pancho Villa. Despite these dangers, he brings his family through the Mexican Revolution into a new life in America.

There are few books in

the last five years that I did not want to end. This was one of them. It was awarded “1st Place—Fiction, novel” in the 2007 Alaska Professional Communicators Communica-tions Contest. Alaska Profes-sional Communicators is the Alaska affiliate of the National Federation of Press Women

This saga explores the his-tory of a family who immigrat-ed to America from Mexico in the early nineteen hundreds. There is an awareness of the detailed research and expert touch necessary to seamlessly intertwine actual historical per-sonages and events with the characters’ story. This novel is a shining example of personal and historical disasters woven with masterful skill to create a bright and colorful tapestry.

The main characters of the book, Prudenciano Nava and Paz Nava are portrayed excep-tionally well. The author let’s you get to know the characters, loveable in their own rights but fallible, as all people are. Some of the less loveable characters are motivated by everything from hunger for admiration and esteem to using others’ weaknesses for their own gain.

The author successfully communicated the vivid imme-diacy of living life constantly on the edge. We feel the grit and dust of the roads of Mexi-co, taste the tobacco and the al-cohol, and feel the desert heat. This book works on various levels, as history, as an adven-ture, or as a social or political commentary. The reader looks through an open window into the past, raw and real.

Review by D.L.A. Review by Jim MiskoISBN: 978-1-59433-048-3Hardcover $29.95Publication Consultants

MELOZIby Mike Travis

Confronted with bears, hordes of mosquitoes, and the realization he is truly on his own, sixteen year-old Michael Travis struggles to become an Alaskan.

MELOZI is a journey to a

time of wide-eyed innocence. Melozi is a snapshot of that time between childhood and adulthood, which most of us quickly lose as we exit our teens. But Melozi reminds us of how important and precious that time is. In reading Melozi we get to see and feel from the perfect perspective: a boy with an undaunted spirit who sees adventure around every bend. From hunting hikes with breathtaking vistas; to fresh fish caught on a line; from chased by a charging grizzly to a young man’s first bar fight; we got to experience what so few have—the untamed Alaska Bush. And that alone is enough to make MELOZI a prize. MELOZI reminded me of elements of my own life, and my youth, and my growth, and my travels. And I love that.

Review by Chris LarsenISBN: 978-1-59433-150-3Softcover $19.95

OH, NO! WE’RE GONNA DIE

by Bob Bell

This is a compilation of short humorous stories of close calls in the Alaska wil-derness. It features a coast of characters uniquely Alaskan and uniformly clueless to Alaska’s dangers.

Even with his great love for

the Alaskan outdoors, it must have taken a little time and a lot of perspective to find humor in the following scenarios:

“I turned to find a young brown bear with my rifle in his mouth!”

“Number one genius couldn’t get the motor started and number two genius real-ized he was standing on the shore with the oars!”

“Helicopters – When the power is off, they have a 90 degree glide slope (straight down)!”

Luckily, in this collection of amazing survival stories, Bob Bell brings together three ap-pealing concepts:

1. During years of adven-tures in the Alaskan wilder-ness, Bob and some of his friends suffered the conse-quences of some short-sight-ed (dumb) choices regarding bears, the weather, and every-thing else one might encounter in the bush! I.e. “Brown bears make their living by smelling stuff,” and “With four people and several hundred pounds of Halibut, I didn’t want any more weight – so I didn’t put any more gas in the plane!”

2. The reader will enjoy learning a great deal about flying, fishing, camping, and hunting in Alaska . The book is a valuable “how-to” and “how-not-to” guide. And

3. Bob makes you laugh! It takes a good storyteller to find humor in sharing the death-defying details of scary, near-misses, but find it he does!

The author has been given nine lives, and this book illus-trates the adventure and excite-ment of the great, Alaskan out-doors

Review by John TippetsISBN: 1-57833-340-7Softcover $14.95

OH, NO!WE’RE GONNA DIE TOO

by Bob Bell

This book is comprised of stories from a wide range of Alaskans. They are people who made I.Q. challenged decisions that result in their being thrust into some very dangerous situations.

Bob Bell packed his wife

and his stuff into his 1966 Mustang and headed to Alaska in 1969. Somehow he learned to fish, hunt and fly in the Great Land. These avocations allowed him the opportunity to make mistakes in each arena and afforded him those kinds of tales told around a campfire with a whiskey in hand.

In his first book, OH NO! WE’RE GONNA DIE, he reveals his personal errors in judgment, skill and temperament in a humorous and self-deprecating manner and you can picture the boys sitting around the fire thumping their thighs and laughing at the near death episodes.

Well—after the first book, friends, compatriots, enemies, even democrats sought out Bob to tell him their tales of near destruction. It got him to thinking—a strange occupation for a writer—they all had similar but different experiences. He wrote them down and built this 240 page book of the risks in outdoors Alaska.

His treatment of each incident lends nothing honorable, heroic, skillful, or educated to the participants. They are treated to slams, embarrassment, hints of carelessness, and mockery. After all—they lived to tell about it and they are friends of his.

It is a book you can read anywhere, anytime. The stories are about eight pages each and have pictures you don’t have to color. Please remember, the people around you will wonder why you are chuckling, and thumping your thigh. The incidents are funny and true.

Review by Jim Misko ISBN: 9-781578-334520Softcover $17.95

Arriving in Valdez in

1898, W. R. Abercrombie encountered what was left of the disastrous stampede over the Valdez Glacier. Hundreds were still strand-ed on the ice field and dy-ing of hunger in the Cop-per River Valley while the lucky few who made it out were living in decrepit min-ing shelters “packed like sardines in a box.” Decid-ing that “70 percent [of the derelict miners] were men-tally deranged,” Abercrom-bie reported that one Swede had talked about a “glacial demon” which had attacked he and son twice. During the second attack, the boy was strangled to death. “When I heard this story there were some ten or twelve other me in the cabin,” Abercrombie wrote, “and at that time, it would not have been safe to dispute the theory of the existence of this demon on the Valdez Glacier, as every man in there firmly believed it to be a reality.”

DEAD PROMISEby Patch Xiong

DEAD PROMISE is a tender story of love and longing wrapped in terror. A magical ride through Hmong mythology, full of surprise and delight from start to finish.

More than a love story,

more than cultural com-mentary, DEAD PROMISE offers readers an insider’s glimpse into the lives of contemporary Hmong peo-ple and delivers a powerful reminder that universal truth transcends time and place.

This novel by Patch Xiong covers the Vietnam war, the Hmong people’s place in it and the terrible price they paid to be a part of the defense of their homeland while despised by the Vietcong and an uneasy ally of the American forces.

The reader follows the pro-tagonist as he wages his per-sonal war with the forces that confront his people. His sight-ing of a young woman stirs his love interest and as it matures with occasional rendezvous’, the dictates of the ongoing war and cultural differences between the villages work at keeping them from sharing a full love.

There is a time when you believe it can never happen. That their love is being spent on dry clay, that it cannot be molded into anything mean-ingful and lasting. When the smoke of battle in the country subsides and there is a moment when the protagonist can make it his priority to find his love, there is a dramatic ending.

Memorable characters and vivid storytelling make this a noteworthy first novel by a writer who values life lived to the fullest.”

Review by Jim MiskoISBN 0741455145Softcover $12.95Infinity Publishing

The story of America is

the collective tale of

Refugees, Immigrants, Deportees, Escapees,

Aliens, Evacuees, Castaways, Ex-Patriots

and Foundlings.

This is

TILLY’S STORY

Someone to howl about!

NOW PLAYING!!!!!

THE PHANTOM DOGSLED

WWW.PARSNACKLE.COM

Best teen writing competition!For the first time ever, Alaskan teenagers will have the opportunity to compete in the writing portion of the national Alliance for Young Artists and Writers competition!

F Magazine is the statewide affiliate, and is now accepting submissions.Teenagers, grades 7-12 can submit as many pieces they like, in a number of categories:

• Journalism• Poetry• Short story

… And more!Statewide winners will have their work showcased at the MTS Gallery in Anchorage and published in a special issue of F Magazine. Their work will then go on to the national competition, where they will have a chance to be published in a national publication and win thousands of dollars in scholarships.

Deadline is Jan. 7, 2011!For more information contact F Magazine: [email protected] - 907.244.6252For writing competition: www.artandwriting.org/Affiliate/AK001W

Ever wonder what became of DB Cooper? Read My Own Story and you’ll know what really happened.

I am getting on in years and have decided it is time to set

the record straight and tell my own story. The decision did

not come easily; part of me wants to keep the mystery

alive and leave everyone to their own conclusions. We are

all aware of the difficulty of keeping a secret, even

when it is in our own best interest.

Emotional weakness finally won out over logic.

http://www.publicationconsultants.com/grant.htm

www.publicationconsultants.com 907-349-2424 fax 907-349-2426

We can print just about anything right here in Alaska. No need any more to ship products from outside the state which is an inefficient use of our world’s dwindling resources and has a large carbon footprint on our environment. Printing locally helps stimulate job growth and expand local business, ensuring Alaska businesses remains solvent. Our mutually beneficial independence depends on producing as much as we can locally.

AT Publishing & Printing907.349.7506 I www.atpublishing.com

Alaska’s Largest, Most Diversified Commercial Printer.

Since 1963.