Join us for a literary adventure and community conversation!

This Community Read will culminate during the Crested Butte Center for the Arts’ Mountain Words Festival with a free author talk at the Gunnison Library on Thursday, May 22th at 6pm. 

FREE COPIES of The Bullet Swallower are available to pick up at each library location beginning May 1. Inside each free book is a bookmark describing of all the other wonderful FREE events happening at the library as part of the 2025 Mountain Words Festival.

About the book:

In 1895, Antonio Sonoro is the latest in a long line of ruthless men. He’s good with his gun and is drawn to trouble but he’s also out of money and out of options. A drought has ravaged the town of Dorado, Mexico, where he lives with his wife and children, and so when he hears about a train laden with gold and other treasures, he sets off for Houston to rob it—with his younger brother Hugo in tow. But when the heist goes awry and Hugo is killed by the Texas Rangers, Antonio finds himself launched into a quest for revenge that endangers not only his life and his family, but his eternal soul.

In 1964, Jaime Sonoro is Mexico’s most renowned actor and singer. But his comfortable life is disrupted when he discovers a book that purports to tell the entire history of his family beginning with Cain and Abel. In its ancient pages, Jaime learns about the multitude of horrific crimes committed by his ancestors. And when the same mysterious figure from Antonio’s timeline shows up in Mexico City, Jaime realizes that he may be the one who has to pay for his ancestors’ crimes, unless he can discover the true story of his grandfather Antonio, the legendary bandido El Tragabalas, The Bullet Swallower.

A family saga that’s epic in scope and magical in its blood, and based loosely on the author’s own great-grandfather, The Bullet Swallower tackles border politics, intergenerational trauma, and the legacies of racism and colonialism in a lush setting and stunning prose that asks who pays for the sins of our ancestors, and whether it is possible to be better than our forebears.

About the author: 

Elizabeth Gonzalez James is a screenwriter and bestselling author of the novels, The Bullet Swallower and Mona at Sea, as well as the chapbook, Five Conversations About Peter Sellers. The Bullet Swallower was named a best book of 2024 by NPR, Esquire, and elsewhere, was a Book of the Month Club pick, and was featured on “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” as one of their spring book club picks. Elizabeth was featured on the MSNBC documentary “My Generation” representing the Millennials. She has taught fiction writing at Grub Street, Pioneer Valley Writers Workshop, Story Studio, and elsewhere. Originally from South Texas, Elizabeth now lives with her family in Massachusetts.

Join us for a collaboration with the Crested Butte Center for the Arts’ Mountain Words Festival with a free author talk at the Gunnison Library on Friday, May 23th at 6pm. Author Kevin Grange will discuss his latest book, Grizzly Confidential: An Astounding Journey into the Secret Life of North America’s Most Fearsome Predator. 

About the book:

His quest takes him from his home in the Tetons to an eerie, mist-shrouded island of gigantic bruins; from the Bear Center at Washington State University—where scientists believe the secrets of hibernation might help treat diabetes, heart disease, and obesity in humans—to the dark underbelly of for-profit wildlife parks, illegal animal trade and black markets hawking bear bile.

Along the way, he meets fascinating biologists and activists and discovers that everything he knew about grizzlies was wrong. Ultimately, his odyssey leads him to find answers on a remote corner of the Alaskan Peninsula where, for the last fifty years, humans have coexisted peacefully alongside the largest gathering of brown bears on the planet.

Grizzly Confidential is about bears but also the inspiring people who look after them. This is a fast-paced, gripping story that educates, entertains, and gives a sneak peek into the secret life of a well-known species. Part science, part travelogue, and a passionate plea for bear conservation, Grizzly Confidential is a lively account for anyone who loves the outdoors and learning about the natural world.

About the author: 

Kevin Grange is a former National Park Ranger and the award-winning author of Wild Rescues: A Paramedic’s Extreme Adventures in Yosemite, Yellowstone, and Grand Teton, along with Beneath Blossom Rain: Discovering Bhutan on the Toughest Trek in the World. His newest book, Grizzly Confidential: An Astounding Journey into the Secret Life of North America’s Most Fearsome Predator was published in September 2024 by Harper Horizon. Aside from writing, Kevin works as a firefighter paramedic with Jackson Hole Fire/EMS, lectures frequently at writing and wilderness medical conferences, and enjoys skiing, mountain biking, and trail running with his wife and golden retriever in the Tetons. Visit him at: www.kevingrange.com

Join us for a collaboration with the Crested Butte Center for the Arts’ Mountain Words Festival with a free author talk at the Gunnison Library on Saturday, May 24th at 6pm. Author Rebecca Boyle will discuss her latest book, OUR MOON: How Earth’s Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are.

About the book:

Many of us know that the Moon pulls on our oceans, driving the tides, but did you know that it smells like gunpowder? Or that it was essential to the development of science and religion? Acclaimed journalist Rebecca Boyle takes readers on a dazzling tour to reveal the intimate role that our 4.51-billion-year-old companion has played in our biological and cultural evolution.

Our Moon’s gravity stabilized Earth’s orbit—and its climate. It drew nutrients to the surface of the primordial ocean, where they fostered the evolution of complex life. The Moon continues to influence animal migration and reproduction, plants’ movements, and, possibly, the flow of the very blood in our veins.

While the Sun helped prehistoric hunters and gatherers mark daily time, early civilizations used the phases of the Moon to count months and years, allowing them to plan farther ahead. Mesopotamian priests recorded the Moon’s position in order to make predictions, and, in the process, created the earliest known empirical, scientific observations. In Our Moon, Boyle introduces us to ancient astronomers and major figures of the scientific revolution, including Johannes Kepler and his influential lunar science fiction.

Our relationship to the Moon changed when Apollo astronauts landed on it in 1969, and it’s about to change again. As governments and billionaires aim to turn a profit from its resources, Rebecca Boyle shows us that the Moon belongs to everybody, and nobody at all.

About the author: 

As a journalist, Rebecca Boyle has reported from particle accelerators, genetic sequencing labs, bat caves, the middle of a lake, and the retractable domes of some of Earth’s largest telescopes. Her first book, OUR MOON: How Earth’s Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are (Random House, 2024) is a new history of humanity’s relationship with the Moon, which Rebecca has not yet visited on assignment. Based in Colorado Springs, Colo., Rebecca is a contributing editor at Scientific American, a contributing writer at Quanta Magazine, and a columnist at Atlas Obscura. She is a frequent contributor to the New York Times and The Atlantic, and her work appears in a wide variety of publications for adults and kids. Rebecca’s work has been anthologized multiple times in the Best American Science and Nature Writing series, and she is the recipient of numerous writing awards, and her first book was longlisted for the National Book Award. Rebecca is a former daily newspaper reporter and lifelong Moon enthusiast.

Join us for a collaboration with the Crested Butte Center for the Arts’ Mountain Words Festival with a free author talk at the Gunnison Library on Sunday, May 25th at 1pm. Author Michael Engelhard will discuss his memoir, Arctic Traverse: A Thousand-Mile Summer of Trekking the Brooks Range.

About the book:

A lyrical memoir that interweaves wilderness, homeland, cultural connections, historical figures, humor, and gritty experiences across northern Alaska, Arctic Traverse: A Thousand-Mile Summer of Trekking the Brooks Range takes readers along on a once-in-a-lifetime journey.

From the award-winning author of Ice Bear: The Cultural History of an Arctic Icon comes an intimate exploration of Alaska’s northernmost mountain range with observations on Indigenous cultures, conservation, and intense cross-country travel, all shaped by respect for the land. Follow author Michael Engelhard through tussock-studded tundra for a remarkable tale of bear encounters and white-knuckled river moments, as well as poetic reflections on a vast, untamed landscape. A trained anthropologist, Engelhard evokes classic writers like Edward Abbey, Barry Lopez, and Ellen Meloy with profound dives into human and natural history and vivid meditations on Alaskan wildlife, flora, and geology. When he embarked on this thru-hike, fewer people had completed it solo in a single push than had dived to the floor of the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of Earth’s oceans.

Much more than a captivating account of a human-powered solo thru-hike and float, Arctic Traverse illuminates the spirit of Alaska, drawing on encounters with Indigenous elders, guided clients, scientists, and others as well as on Engelhard’s long-held dream and his experiences of the land itself.

About the author: 

Trained as an anthropologist with a degree from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Michael Engelhard worked for twenty-five years as a wilderness guide and outdoor instructor in Alaska and on the Colorado Plateau. The editor of four anthologies and author of Ice Bear, a cultural history of the polar bear, he has won three Alaska Press Club Awards, and a Rasmuson Individual Artist Award. Recent books include the National Outdoor Book Award-winning memoir Arctic Traverse as well as What the River Knows: Essays from the Heart of Alaska, and the Grand Canyon essay collection No Walk in the Park. His writing has also appeared in publications like Outside, Sierra, Backpacker, National Parks, Audubon, Utne Reader, and Times Literary Supplement, with more than a hundred articles in Alaska magazine. Engelhard currently lives in Moab again, working on a book about Nome, where he also has been a resident.