Keep It Wild with Jason Mark & Island Press
In May 2016, Island Press sent four winners on a hike along the Arizona Trail with author Jason Mark in our Keep It Wild sweepstakes. Here's a bit from Jason about that fantastic trip!
hiking
Backpacking the Arizona Trail with Jason Mark
By Rebecca Bright / On November 8th, 2016
Here at Island Press, I spend much of my time reading about our authors’ work in wild and remote places from the confines of a desk chair. So last May, I jumped at the chance to venture away from the office on a backpacking trip with Jason Mark, author of Satellites in the High Country, and the winners of our Keep It Wild sweepstakes contest.
#KeepItWild Q&A with Jason Mark
By Jason Mark / On February 25th, 2016
Enter the sweepstakes here!
Why is Arizona significant to you and why should it be significant to the rest of the world?
I was born and raised in Arizona, and I have a huge affection for the place: the Sonoran Desert with its creosote cloves, the “sky islands” around Tucson, the ponderosa pine forests outside of Prescott where I learned how to ride horses. And of course the Grand Canyon, which is a marvel of the world.
Rants from the Hill: As winter looms, a final foray to close out the season
By Michael Branch / On January 4th, 2016
Out here in the windy expanse of the high, wild, western Great Basin Desert, highway 395 is our lifeline.
Rant from the Hill: An Assay on Old Lang Syne Peak
By Michael Branch / On January 5th, 2015
“Rants from the Hill” is cross-posted from High Country News
Every New Year’s Eve, drunk people from around the world sing some approximation of “Auld Lang Syne,” a song whose words they rarely know—though one of the song’s many strengths is that when arm-in-arm revelers slur out “For hold and sign” or “Fart old Ann Zyne” or “Four old aunts shine” it still sounds damned good.
Rants from the Hill: Seashells on Desert Mountaintops
By Michael Branch / On October 21st, 2013
Our daughter Caroline is six years old, a fact that is less important to her than the much more exciting fact that she is about to turn seven. The other day Caroline and I were discussing plans for her birthday celebration when she asked, out of nowhere, “If I’m going to be seven, how old is the earth going to be?” “Four and a half billion,” I replied.
Rants from the Hill: Arid Lands Bibliopedestrianism
By Michael Branch / On September 9th, 2013
I’ll admit that those of us who live in remote desert places tend to be idiosyncratic, though it is unclear to me whether the weird are attracted to the wild, dry country or if we are instead sculpted by it. And when you live in relative isolation—and in a physical environment that conspires with that isolation to scour away affectation and superfluity—you discover some odd things about yourself, among which is that you are odd.