Chico writer's exposé of the U.S. Forest Service

The mission of the U.S. Forest Service is the management of almost 200 million acres of timberland. According to Christopher Burchfield, who worked for the agency, that mission has been systematically undermined since the late 1970s. "In 1973," he writes, "Gene C. Bernardi, a female U.S. Forest Service research sociologist, filed a class action lawsuit charging the agency with sex discrimination. In 1979 the Forest Service entered into a consent decree with the plaintiff."

Burchfield sifted through thirty-seven boxes of "letters, reports, directives and minutes of meetings" at the Federal Records Storage Center in San Bruno, all relating to the civil suit. The result of his investigations, which include interviews with current and former Forest Service employees affected by the consent decree, is "The Tinder Box: How Politically Correct Ideology Destroyed the U.S. Forest Service" ($27.95 in paperback from Stairway Press, www.stairwaypress.com; also available in Barnes and Noble Nook e-book format).

Burchfield is scheduled to sign copies of his book at Barnes and Noble in Chico this Thursday, October 4, at 6:30 p.m. An interview with the author, conducted by Nancy Wiegman of Nancy's Bookshelf on KCHO (Northstate Public Radio, 91.7 FM) is available at http://goo.gl/uOWm4.

As the effect of the Bernardi consent decree began to radiate outward, Burchfield contends, more and more qualified men were passed over in favor of a misguided egalitarianism, putting women into positions for which they were psychologically and physically unqualified. Merit promotion was undermined and the agency was beset by legal challenges to its policies.

In 1999, after he started working for the Mendocino National Forest, Burchfield concluded "that the U.S. Forest Service's effort to reach gender parity in all professions and grade levels had been an unmitigated disaster." The agency, he says, was "demoralized and utterly without a sense of mission," plagued by laziness, absenteeism, victimhood, and incompetence.

In 1986, Burchfield writes, for a time the "Forests began purchasing lightweight, single-ply fire hoses fifty feet in length with plastic fittings attached" so female firefighters could more easily handle them. But the hoses "had a propensity to kink, popped leaks by the score" and--melted.

"The Tinder Box" aims to explain "why, over the past twenty years, ninety million acres of American's wild lands have gone up in flames.

Ishi's world

Local independent researcher Richard Burrill is in the midst of a multi-volume project detailing everything known about Ishi and his people. Newly published is "Ishi's Untold Story In His First World, Parts III-VI: A Biography Of The Last Of His Band Of Yahi Indians In North America" ($39.95 in paperback from The Anthro Company or ishifacts.com).

"Ishi," Burrill writes, "was likely born at the very end of 'Babies Born Time' (February), according to the Yahi calendar in the white man's year, 1854." A member of the Yahi, the only remaining members of the Yani people, he was taken into custody in Oroville in 1911, spent his remaining years at the Museum of Anthropology in the Bay Area, and died of tuberculosis in 1916.

But what of Ishi's "first world"? By the time Ishi was three, Burrill says, "a way of living that had spanned 3,000 years was ending. ... To learn about the First World is to learn about what was lost."

Burrill will be speaking at Lyon Books in Chico on Tuesday, September 25 at 7:00 p.m.

The author's book is packed with historical photographs, newspaper clippings and other documents, maps, timelines, reports of personal explorations, Yana creation myths, and more. Together they tell a story not only of what was lost, but of the "near genocide" of California tribes. Since documentary evidence of Ishi's growing up years is of course scant, Burrill relies on informed speculation. There is much more evidence of tribal massacres, such as the "1864 wholesale purge of the Yana in Shasta and Tehama counties by Whites of conservatively 500 native people ... one of the biggest massacres of American Indians in U.S. history."

The Yahi also had to contend with "roaming and pursued fugitive natives." In 1862-1863, "the Sacramento Valley and the foothills became a protracted war zone. The settlers continued to confuse Ishi's established Yahi/Yana band for the renegade 'Mill Creeks.'" "The Yahi, being distinctly more aboriginal-looking," were deemed most dangerous. Burrill also tells the story of the "Long Concealment," when the remaining Yahi went into hiding in 1870 for almost forty years.

The bottom line for Burrill: "Ishi's formidable legacy of integrity, hope, and courage serves as a symbol for change, calling for a more respectful and caring world today for all peoples."

A comic novel from a Butte College instructor

Consider 29-year-old Mat Roper. "Handsome, with shoulder-length blond hair and an ocean tan, the Californian looked like a king among the dour-eyed country folks and pale Midwestern collegians returning to farms for Christmas." Roper is on board a bus bound for Dickeyville, Wisconsin, to meet Daphne's family. Daphne Dickey, his fiancée, in the town named after her ancestors.

It's snowing, and very cold, and a strange old man on the bus seems overly talkative. You've got to understand the Midwest, says the man, by reading its writers. "Because it's like the winter insomnia, when it comes. Like a bare bulb swaying while a blizzard pounds your hundred-year-old farmhouse. Same place your Pappy and Ma was married and died in, buried in the family graveyard next to your grandmother and father. Same storm rages in your soul, son. Nor-wester of hunger and fear. ..."

So, Dickeyville, population 999, and Mat arrives just in time for Dickeyville Horror Days, a boar hunt of mythical proportions, hunting a boar of mythical proportions. "European wild boar," one local tells him. "A killer who runs to five hundred pounds, judging from the hoof prints. ... Most dangerous animal in North America" haunting the great Mazy forest wherein dwelt old Dead Alice and her witchy wiles.

Butte College language arts instructor Joe Abbott has created a strange and wondrous world in "Dickeyville" ($17.50 in paperback from Starhaven; also available in Amazon Kindle e-book format). Abbott will be signing copies of his book at a free literary event tomorrow night at 7:00 p.m. at Lyon Books in Chico.

There's Ma and Pa, Verne, Bascom, the well-endowed twins Twila and Cabella, Buster Hieman, and a cartload more: "Dickeyville hicks," Mat thinks. Yet he is "flummoxed by hayseed yokels." There's the boar hunt, and "angel dinosaur bones," all in the "little town with twisty streets and twisted jokes. ... Crazy beer-swilling hicks with muscles by Jake."

Part of the fun of the story is to see the Roper get hog-tied. And then some. Says Mat: "I feel like I stepped in a pile of Dickeyville."

"Dickeyville" is a comic novel rife with oddballs who are never quite what they seem. Abbott's radiant prose reminds us there are plenty of snow jobs to go around.

Family-friendly Paleo cookbook from a Chico mom

Sarah Fragoso came slowly to the Paleo lifestyle. Robb Wolf, of NorCal Strength and Conditioning in Chico, introduced her to the eating plan, but it wasn't until just a few years ago, after the birth of her third son, and plagued by a host of health issues, that she got serious. "I eventually committed to trying Paleo for thirty days," she writes, "and that was all the convincing I needed."

Now that her three kids, and husband John, have made the move to Paleo, Fragoso is spreading the word. First came "Everyday Paleo" and "Paleo Pals: Jimmy and the Carrot Rocket Ship," and now "Everyday Paleo Family Cookbook: Real Food for Real Life" ($29.95 in paperback from Victory Belt Publishing; also available in Amazon Kindle and Barnes and Noble Nook e-book formats). Replete with gorgeous full-color photographs by Michael J. Lang, the book is more than just a recipe collection. It's also a realistic guide to Paleo meals on a budget and what to put into the kids' lunch boxes, with more at everydaypaleo.com.

"The primary tenets of living a Paleo lifestyle," Fragoso says, include avoiding "grains, legumes, dairy, vegetable oils, refined sugar" and "highly processed foods. ... Eat meat from animals that lived the way nature intended their species to live--e.g., cattle fed on grass; eat both vegetables and fruit, but eat more vegetables than fruits; eat quality fats like avocado and coconut oil; eat nuts and seeds, but in moderation."

The transition to Paleo can be challenging. "If you grumble and gripe about no longer having cereal for breakfast, your little ones will, too." But "if you hand them a spatula and show them how to crack eggs as you laugh and giggle together, no one will miss the cereal."

Fragoso, a recent visitor to Lyon Books in Chico, draws on the main recipe section in creating helpful lists. There are 15 lunch box ideas, 15 "quick and simple" meals, a one-week meal plan and a week's shopping list. Recipe categories include sauces and dips, slow cooker recipes, soups and stews, "meaty meals," sides and salads, and fruity creations. Most of the recipes have a "something extra" section with creative variations.

And for an energy boost? There's even a recipe for "Rocket Fuel."

Chico author's fast-paced mystery

"Dentists," writes retired dentist Mike Paull, "have been represented many times in books and movies, but always as either villains or buffoons." So he invented Brett Raven who, like Paull, is also a pilot. "I decided the protagonist in a mystery novel does not need to be a lawyer, ex-cop or medical examiner. As long as he is smart, resourceful, and courageous, he can emerge from any field or any profession." Brett, as he is called, is certainly all of those things. His expertise is key in unraveling the fate of his former friend, fellow pilot, and financial advisor John Thomas (J.T.) Talbot. Readers won't be able to put the book down until all is revealed.

"Flight of Betrayal" ($15.99 in paperback from Skyhawk Publishing; also available in Amazon Kindle format) begins with horrendous news. J.T., though an expert pilot, crashes on his way home from a Baja fishing trip. "J.T. had been Brett's friend," Paull writes, "until he married Annie, Brett's ex-wife. They were still able to remain partners in the twin engine Beechcraft Baron, which they flew out of San Carlos, an airport located thirty miles south of San Francisco." The FAA called, Annie tells Brett. "There was a horrendous fire and both J.T. and his passenger were burned beyond recognition." The subsequent investigation would close the case as "pilot error." But Brett will not let go.

Mike Paull will be signing copies of his book Thursday, September 6, at 7:00 p.m. at the Chico Barnes and Noble bookstore.

Brett may want to take a bite out of crime, but as his own investigation proceeds he is confronted by some pretty shady (and dangerous) characters involved in the illegal trafficking of human organs from Mexico to the U.S. Then there's the story of Brett and Annie, the sundering of a marriage and the slow, tentative movement toward renewal. Brett is consumed with finding the truth but he also realizes how devastating it will be to Annie.

There are bad guys aplenty (with, shall we say, very limited vocabulary) standing in the way, and the reader takes delight as Brett (pilot and forensic dentist) gums up the works (so to speak). The tale is satisfyingly convoluted, the sex tender, the hero someone worth rooting for. It's great fun.

Suspense fiction from a Willows writer

Newspaper columnist Shari Edwards, in her debut novel, tells the tale of Julie Morgan and her younger sister, Ann, who have returned to their rural Northern California hometown of Crowville to sift through their mother's effects. Julie, now in her early thirties, discovers an old newspaper story about a gruesome murder. She read the story as a little girl, the headline a shuddery memory: "Local Child's Body Found In Shallow Grave Beside the River." The child, Julie found out later, had lived in Crowville.
Now here was the old article, only this time with annotations from Ann and Julie's mother. There was a phone number, the names "Zac" and "Officer Jennings," and two places: Casper, Wyoming, and Alamosa, Colorado. And at the bottom of the article were the chilling, handwritten words: "Killer never found?"
Frightening events begin to terrorize the two women almost immediately as they clean their parents' old house to ready it for sale. Are those crunching sounds in the gravel outside just imaginary? That shadow by the window--real? But the note on the kitchen table is very real indeed. "Get out of town," it says, "or you will end up like they did."
"Murder In Mendocino" ($10 in paperback from Stansbury Publishing; available from Lyon Books in Chico and also from the author, SHASHANEE@aol.com) introduces the reader to Crowville's police chief, Sam Davis, his wife, Madge, and a handsome man in a silver Jaguar who turns out not to be a nemesis but a Denver detective, Will Jamison. Julie and Ann become convinced that their mother's death was no accident, and their father's death some years earlier in a hunting accident--well, that was no accident, either.
Even as the little group tries to unravel the mystery of the deaths of Charles and Beth Morgan, and that little girl so many years ago, death stalks Sam Davis in the form of Phillip Stone, Madge's nephew. He had escaped from a psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane in Alamosa, Colorado, and had vowed to get his revenge on Sam, who put him there. Will had come to California to bring him back. But Phillip had died in a recent car accident in Mendocino, his body burned beyond recognition, right? Right?
"Murder In Mendocino" reveals all and, at the end, the reader can begin to breathe again.

Thoughts of Maine from a Northern California poet

Marilyn Ringer spends summers on Monhegan Island in Maine welcoming the dawn. According to a biographical note, she writes there "with a group of women who are artists, teachers, Gestalt therapists, and gardeners as well as writers." Ringer "has been a chef and restaurateur, a poet-teacher with California's Poets in the Schools, and a teacher of adult creative writing workshops."

She's gathered thirty-seven of her evocative poems, many of which appeared in literary journals, in "Island Aubade" ($12 in paperback from Finishing Line Press, www.finishinglinepress.com). The dictionary defines "aubade" as a "morning love song" or "a song or poem of lovers parting at dawn."

As the poet says in the title piece, "Let other mornings exalt themselves with portent's light, / and giddy eddies of anticipation. // Let other mornings sing of legendary heroes, of battles won, / long removed from the bloody cost. // Let them speak for the tilted earth as it chooses its inclination. // Give me this morning, this morning of waking into a breeze / of birdsong that buoys me up, // out of the heavy sea of sleep, out of the fog of memory. ..."

Ringer will be reading her poems, and signing copies of her book, at Lyon Books in Chico on Tuesday, August 21 at 7:00 p.m.

The surroundings awaken in the poet a sense of something about to break into consciousness. In "Night Ocean" the poet sings, "Muted and vast but not without voice: / rush of eddies, wave whisper, whale song. // Beneath the surface the dream floats, / suspended in such uterine sounds. ...."

The poems weave daily life, presence--and absence--into the island's natural rhythms. "I live on an aura's edge," the poet writes in "From The Periphery," "that prismatic in-between / of color and light; sometimes I am invisible / even to myself. // In this place I walk the dusty road / and navigate the island trails / unusually alone, // a comparison of loss: the old way / forever relinquished, the new / not fully born. ... // I dip into the salty hue breaking the line: / this side of air, that side of water; / this side of now, // that side of forever and after. ..."

New York Times Article on Self-Publishing

Alan Finder details the options for self publishing in The Joys and Hazards of Self-Publishing on the Web.

Dave Kilbourne, between the covers

The same guy who opened up Pyromania Tallow Works in Chico way back in the last millennium, the same guy who became the Executive Director of the Downtown Chico Business Association, the same guy who wrote a Northstate Voices column in this newspaper for a year, this same guy has crammed as many of his (more or less) true stories as possible into a volume with the unlikely title of "Miss Gladys and the Pit Bull Barracuda and Other Amazing True Stories of Human Adventure" ($14.95 in paperback from Flying Pig Press, www.flyingpigpress.net).

Kilbourne owes his inspiration to his jobs (Forest Service Lookout Tower Operator, Wrangler of Rattlesnakes, school psychologist); his "eccentric" father (Chamber of Commerce leader and pyramidologist); his saintly mother ("Gladys" of the title) and Great American brother (Dixon Roy Kilbourne); his daughter Savannah ("Miss Awesome Face," "the finest daughter in all the land"); and his love of brew--so much so that his "16-Step Method for Writing a Simple Story" mentions the Sierra Nevada Taproom ("The Church of the Holy Nectar") at least seven times. He's a proud graduate of Beer Camp #69. He writes his stuff near the pizza oven.

Kilbourne will be signing copies of his book Tuesday, August 14 at 7:00 p.m. at Lyon Books in Chico. Look for a forthcoming interview by Nancy Wiegman of Nancy's Bookshelf on KCHO (Northstate Public Radio, 91.1 FM); the archive is found at kchofm.podbean.com.

The author is enamored with contraptions, like "Uncle Bubba's Electronified Pork-Pulling Machine, a Modern Miracle!" or the "Porkgasmic Belly Rotator." (His fixation on pigs comes from his early "farmer boy" days. He referred to his pet pig, Barker, as "Little Mr. Pulled Pork Sandwich.") The book contains historical photographs to prove everything, though the story about the farmer's wife and her own appropriation of the "Hog Joy" unit is told with, shall we say, a sense of delicate restraint.

As a bonus, the reader is graced with the recipe for "Rice Orgy Parisienne." A guy gets hungry up there is the Timber Mountain lookout, and if you're spotting lightning strikes you don't have time to be picky: Three pounds of rice, melted cheddar, six cans of tuna covered with French dressing. Kilbourne does nothing by half measures in this laugh-out-loud collection.

What You Need To Know If You’re Self-Publishing

The Executive Editor of CNET, David Carnoy, has a current and comprehensive post, 25 Things You Need To Know. It’s worth a careful read.

Note To Readers and Writers

Thanks for visiting my blog as I “muse” on some of the latest book offerings!

In the days ahead I hope not only to continue offering reviews of books with a Northern California connection, but to add additional reviews as well.

Publishing is going through a sea-change: Bookstores are faced with major challenges, e-book sales now make up a significant percentage of all books sold, and self-publishing has lost its “vanity press” stigma. One can hardly keep up with all the changes.

I’m asked frequently how one might go about publishing a book in this new environment, so as I come across helpful links I’ll pass them along here. Readers these days often become writers.

That’s something to muse about!

A story of emotional healing from a Redding novelist

Tired of mooching off her friend Lily, Jamie Shire determines to leave Grass Valley and find a life, if not fame and fortune, somewhere else. She winds up in the Sonoma area working for a mysterious millionaire philanthropist, Akasha Duval, at Duval's Fallow Springs mansion. Her job is to research causes that Duval might support. Akasha is beautiful but aloof, frequently gone from the estate, giving Jamie precious little guidance.

There are others caring for Fallow Springs. Beah is an older woman, Ana someone of few words, and Zahir tends the garden. As the story unfolds, so do the lives behind the names. Some have been physically mutilated and all have suffered terribly, including Jamie, whose daughter Clara was killed before birth by her father. Santos is in prison and Jamie, 27, is mired in regret and resentment.

In "Out Of The Shadows" ($14.95 in paperback from FirstSnowPublishingHouse.com) Kimberly Carlson mixes the intensely personal with Jamie's growing involvement in movements to stop genocide on the African continent. It's the Bush era, and Western eyes seem blind to the what is occurring a world away. Carlson herself, who has taught creative writing at Shasta College, is a member of "Genocide No More--Save Darfur."

Carlson will be talking about her writing, and signing copies of her book, at a free literary event tomorrow night at 7:00 p.m. at Lyon Books in Chico.

Jamie journeys to the refugee camps in Chad and falls in love with a doctor volunteering there. "Thad had a way of filling all my empty spots. When I was around him, I was consumed with desire and fulfillment at the same time. ... Thad was my Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca, my Ralph Fiennes in The English Patient. I was a woman with Thad. ..." Jamie, addicted to films, sees her life as if it were scenes from her favorite movies. Only later does she realize that she might write her own script, become her own director.

But that will require Jamie to confront the unsettling truths she discovers about her family. And the heartbreaking mistreatment of powerless humans haunts her and inspires her to make a difference. Ana, smelling of "peppermint and yeast," has a severed tongue. Will Jamie speak for her?

An indispensable planner for caregivers

When she was eighteen, local author Tory Zellick became the primary caregiver for her mother, who had been diagnosed with breast cancer. "The next six and a half years," Zellick writes, "were filled with doctor appointments, surgical procedures, tests, scans, and treatments." She was "the official 'form-filler-outer.' We made the best of every day; she continued to be positive and instilled hope in our family. Her strength and the incredible journey we made together as a family unit shaped who my brother, father, and I have become."

Her death in 2009 led Zellick to rethink the care process and she realized what she lacked was a "fill-in-the-blank guide to track Mom's care" to lessen stress on the caregiver. "A caregiver is only as useful to the person they are caring for as they are to themselves." A caregiver's ability to help diminishes without adequate sleep, exercise, proper food--and readily accessible medical information.

Zellick's experience led her to create "The Medical Day Planner: The Guide To Help Navigate The Medical Maze" ($34.95 spiral bound from Victory Belt Publishing). She will be appearing at Lyon Books in Chico tomorrow night at 7:00 p.m. and caregivers, especially, are invited to attend this free event.

The book is divided into tabbed sections including patient information, phone book, medications, appointments, treatment, history, hospitalizations, and notes. The last section is devoted to the 52-week day planner, each day divided into 15-minute segments, that can organize caregiver "shifts," for example, or medical processes ("8:15 drink contrast; 9:15 arrive at hospital for scan"). Zellick introduces each section and offers examples of how it can be used. Her tone is positive but frank. Documentation is essential in discovering patterns or trends in the health of the one being cared for, and vital when new doctors or new hospitals become part of the caring process.

Because it's spiral bound, the planner opens flat so entries are easy to make. Many of its pages contain practical tips, such as the importance of using the "medication pickup chart" to track who is picking up which medication when. She also discusses financial affairs, trusts vs. wills, attorneys, and medical insurance brokers.

The planner and its website (allthingscaregiver.com) are essential companions for those who seek to provide compassionate and effective care.

What's happened to our water?

"Water is a valuable, exhaustible resource," writes Robert Glennon, Professor of Law and Public Policy at the University of Arizona. By "exhaustible" he means the right kind of water (the drinkable kind, for example) is increasingly not in the right place at the right time. If in the recent past water was treated "as valueless and inexhaustible," these days few of us are strangers to the latest Sierra snowpack report or headlines about irrigation allotments.

"Water lubricates the American economy just as oil does," Glennon observes. "It is intimately linked to energy because it takes water to make energy, and it take energy to divert, pump, move, and cleanse water. ... A prosperous future depends on a secure and reliable water supply. And we don't have it. To be sure, water still flows from taps, but we're draining our reserves like gamblers at the craps table."

His engaging survey of water rights (and wrongs) was first published in 2009 but, if anything, is even more relevant today. "Unquenchable: America's Water Crisis And What To Do About It" ($19.95 in paperback from Island Press; also in Amazon Kindle and Barnes and Noble Nook e-book formats) is the 2012-2013 Book in Common at Chico State University and Butte College. Many other community organizations take part in book discussions, and the author is scheduled to speak at the university's Laxson Auditorium on Friday, October 5, at 7:30 p.m. (Visit http://goo.gl/R3RXP for ticket information.)

Divided into three parts ("The Crisis," "Real and Surreal Solutions," and "A New Approach"), Glennon's book looks carefully at some of the contemporary "answers" and finds them wanting. "In the past when we needed more water, we engineered our way out of the problem by diverting rivers, building dams, or drilling wells. Today, with few exceptions, those options are not viable solutions."

Glennon's own proposals are not without controversy. "We must raise the price of water" to provide "incentives to conserve." And he advocates a regulated market solution with "quantified and transferable" water rights. "We should require those proposing new development to purchase and retire existing water rights in order to break the relentless cycle of overuse and move toward sustainable water use."

So, as we think about water policy, is our glass half empty--or half full?

A science-fiction thriller from a local writer

Dan O'Brien is editor of Empirical. Distributed nationally, each issue of the Chico-based magazine delves into the world of human experience with a literary sensibility and willingness to explore new paths. But O'Brien is also a prolific novelist, honing his craft with each exploration of a new world or a human mind.

"Born in Connecticut," he writes in a published interview, "I moved with my family several times over the course of my childhood. Having lived in several states and attended many institutions, I have a unique perspective of the human condition. Each new place, every new relationship, has allowed for me to paint from a rich easel of colors. A lifelong practitioner and enthusiast of martial arts, elements of spiritualism and eastern culture have found a home in my works."

In "Cerulean Dreams" ($14.95 in paperback from CreateSpace; also in Amazon Kindle format), O'Brien imagines a future in which "the world had become an immensely safe place. There was no war. Poverty had been abolished, laws and rituals instituted that would maintain the pleasant temperament of the new-formed society." Every citizen is "implanted in their temple with a motherboard chip." They sleep by day and arise at night. Utopia.

A great many lives had been "lost in the Water Rights Wars of 2076" but, as the news reports, "it marked the inception of the Cerulean Dreams Corporation. And eventually the gathering of the citizens of Earth into the newly-manufactured Orion, the first and last safe haven for humankind."

But utopia is not what it seems in this page-turner. Alexander Marlowe refuses to upgrade his chip software and goes off the grid. He is investigating the seeming murders of young women when he encounters Dana, still alive. Haunted by "shadows," Marlowe and Dana plan to escape Orion, to get outside the city where there is nothing but lifeless desert. Or so they've been told.

The Company, and the mysterious group behind it, want Dana back no matter the cost. What follows are a series of horrific and bloody encounters with the assassin Armon, and the discovery in the desert of a village shaman who points Marlowe to the answers he seeks. Minds must be free, not controlled--but there is a gruesome cost to that freedom.

History of the "Ridge Route"

Call it an "alternative" to taking Highway 70. The "Ridge Route" begins in Oroville, moves on to the Bidwell Bar suspension bridge, Berry Creek, Bucks Lake, and on to Quincy. The roadway has had a checkered history, at one time forming a vital link to Oroville as emigrants arrived at Quincy from the eastern US, at other times lying in disrepair.

Independent researcher David M. Brown has drawn on a wealth of documentation to tell the tale of "The Oroville-Quincy Ridge Route: Development, Eclipse, and Renewal of a Transportation Artery" ($20 in paperback from the Association for Northern California Historical Research, www.csuchico.edu/anchr). It includes maps, black-and-white and color photographs, and an extensive bibliography.

Though a work of historical scholarship, the book can be enjoyed by anyone with a hankering to travel what used to be part of the old Beckwourth Trail in the mid-1800s. To that end Brown devotes a chapter to 34 "places of interest," beginning in Quincy "where Main Street, Crescent Street and Court Street come together. This intersection has been the route's beginning since the Quincy & Spanish Ranch Wagon Road was constructed" in 1855. (That part of the Ridge Route was a private toll road.)

Brown writes that "after its first few years of prominence, the Ridge Route experienced a gradual change in use and a fairly steady decline in importance for about 130 years, eclipsed first by usage of competing wagon roads and later by rail and motor vehicle roads through the canyon of the North Fork and East Branch of the Feather River. ... Road improvements beginning in the early 1980s, following an upgrade of Big Creek Road for use by trucks and recreational vehicles, re-opened the Ridge Route to the casual user and made it viable for more commercial usage."

Speaking of commerce, "Charles E. Boles, alias Black Bart, appears to have made two heists on the western side of the route." There were always challenges, especially from the weather. The winter of 1889-90 brought ten-foot snow depths in Quincy and today the road is passable only six or eight months a year. But Brown is "cautiously optimistic" about the route's continued scenic and recreational value.

The road, it turns out, is 66 miles long. We have our own "route 66."

Beer guide reflects its craft

"I think the craft beer world," writes Ken Weaver, "asks a person a very simple question: What do you really want? And I believe that's one of the more important questions we can ask ourselves--whether framed in terms of taste, or how we choose to consume things, or how we interact with the communities around us, or (in the most immediate sense) how willing we are to savor what's directly in front of us. That's what I see in my glass, and having met so many enthusiastic beer lovers of late, I think many of them see it in theirs as well."

Weaver's project, and that of his photographer wife Anneliese (Ali) Schmidt, is "The Northern California Craft Beer Guide" ($21.95 in paperback from Cameron + Company). Full color throughout, beautifully printed, the book is by turns informative, whimsical, funny--and useful. Ken Grossman, owner and founder of Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, provides the foreword.

"When I made my first commercial batch of beer in 1980," Grossman writes, "the industry had hit a low point, and only about forty breweries remained. ... I would literally go door to door to different bars and sell single bottles of Pale Ale. Back then, people thought I was nuts! It was several years and loads of good luck later that we began to see more people moving toward bolder beers."

Today, says Weaver, "Northern California is home to over 150 breweries, approaching one-tenth of the nation's total, and the number of notable beer bars, bottle shops, and other craft beer-centric venues is of similar magnitude."

The guide divides California, from the Bay Area north, into eight regions, and highlights key "beer destinations" as well as other craft beer venues. The "North I-5, Chico, and Shasta Cascade" section lists eighteen stops, including the Mt. Shasta Brewing Co. in Weed; bottlecaps say "Try Legal Weed."

Weaver has chosen the best, but he's not afraid to say when a facility doesn't quite measure up. Sidebars abound, highlighting almost twenty beer styles (such as Hefeweizen/Wheat Ale), beer communities, sustainability, beer bloggers, festivals, and beer vs. wine. "Wine can be deliciously complex," Weaver writes. "Beer can be deliciously complex." Wine's complexity varies with the harvest; beer depends on the brewer's artistry. It's a heady thought.

Celebrating the fortieth anniversary of "The Donner Party"

George Keithley's "The Donner Party" ($16.95 in paperback from George Braziller), first published in 1972, is a "lean, taut, narrative poem" (to quote the New York Times). The Chico poet produced an American masterwork, a haunting eulogy for the company, led by George Donner, bound for California in April of 1846. More than half would not survive.

Lyon Books in Chico is honoring Keithley at a book signing and reading Tuesday at 7:00 p.m.

"I am George Donner a dirt farmer," the poem begins, "who left the snowy fields / around Springfield, Illinois / in the fullness of my life // and abandoned the land / where we had been successful / and prosperous people // and brought a party of eighty men / women and children / west by wagon."

Along the route most everything except food is left behind. It's not the "established trail," and weeks are wasted hacking a path. One might wonder if the land was abandoning them.

"Jacob's oldest son / let the sweat run // from his blond beard / as he halted there / in a trance. He left // his hand on the haft / of his ax and stood / staring up the slope // where he was to cut / but his mind was gone-- / a man may see a valley // overgrown with trees / or a simple stream / struck by sunlight // and in the cave of his chest / his heart falls / because he loves // the land too much with his eyes / and he feels unneeded / he is jealous // of the generous nature / of all things, whether / they are large or small // vegetable or mineral / and the wild life / and the long lights of space // so he cannot / move on nor come / deep into the place."

Bad timing and bad directions prove their undoing. Earlier, Donner remembers, "we were still bemused / by the myths of maps. ... But that was before / we came // to feel / the slow intelligence of the snow / groping over the ground. ..." Grisly events mingle with dreams of a better land.

The immense sadness here encompasses us all.

Letters from wartime California

"For over 50 years," writes Gridley resident Joan Brock, "Rigmor, my grandmother's niece, lovingly kept Helga's notebooks safe in her home in Copenhagen." Those notebooks contained letters that Helga, then living in Palo Alto, wrote to her family in Denmark during World War II. Because of the Nazi occupation the letters could not be mailed, but Helga continued to write them anyway, filling five notebooks during wartime. "Rigmor told me she had saved these letters and wanted to give them to me, but she just could not bear to part with them." Eventually she made copies and sent them to Brock "in 2005, just prior to her death. I found the letters so compelling, I published them."

The collection, lightly annotated, is called "My Dear, Dear Rigmor: Helga's Letters Written During WWII" ($19.99 in paperback from Xlibris; also in Amazon Kindle and Barnes and Noble Nook e-book formats). Nancy Wiegman interviewed Joan Brock for Nancy's Bookshelf, which airs on KCHO (Northstate Public Radio, 91.7 FM) Friday mornings at 10:00 a.m.; the archive is found at http://goo.gl/BMMB0.

Helga's letters are a profoundly human mix of family minutiae and geopolitical reflections. "Coffee goes on rationing next week--one pound per person from 15 years old and up--every 5 weeks. That's still enough" (November 25, 1942). "For the first time, millions of people in the U.S. are paying income tax" (March 12, 1944). "All the years I lived here, I can't see a good-looking head of cauliflower, that [I] don't want it, and every time I do buy it, I am disappointed. It never did taste good like they did at home" (May 14, 1945).

She grieves for her family in Denmark. Her characterizations of the Germans and Japanese (especially the Japanese) are brutal. December 7, 1941 is seared in her memory. "But that was their first mistake, that unforgettable sneak punch, because it united every man, woman, and child in the United States. And believe me, nobody in the world can fight us down. This is still the land of liberty, the land of the free, and will always be so." Her surviving son, Ralph, is fighting overseas; her thoughts are never far from him.

Helga is by turns resolute, cranky, tearful, opinionated, patriotic. In this book she still speaks.

Local essayist on roads taken and not taken

"I was a senior in high school," writes Daniel Thomas, "when Dwight Eisenhower was elected to a second term, the musical Carousel was playing at local theatres, the stock market had surpassed 500 for the first time, and Elvis Presley was singing 'Heartbreak Hotel.' It was also the year my dad asked me if I would be interested in becoming a full partner in his neighborhood grocery store, Tommy's Superette."

Taylor said no because he wanted to teach. "Looking back," he says, "I suppose that it was jut as well that I was ignorant of the struggles my parents were having, or I might never have left Willows."

"Wanderings: Book Five In A Series Of Essays" ($9.95 in paperback from Stansbury Publishing) presents brief reflections on some of things that happened next, including an Army stint in Germany. Thomas' previous books ("Essays From The Ten," "Evening Country," "100 Miles," and "Pastiche: An Essayist In Search Of A Theme") have looked outward. "Wanderings" looks back and takes stock.

It was a circuitous route to a career as a teacher and high school principal, winding through marriages and divorces, Amtrack travels ("an opiate separating me from a reality that I chose to ignore"), bouts with the bottle and ill health, and feelings of worthlessness and loneliness.

Yet resilience pervades these essays, especially in a piece called "Hey, He's Seventy!!" "As my life continues to unfold," Taylor writes, "I find myself focusing more on what is good and less and less about my setbacks. I had my first heart attack when I was forty-seven and retired from my professional life much earlier than most. I consider myself fortunate that, by moving away from what was a hectic, demanding lifestyle, I was able to 'reboot' my goals in life." Though increasingly suspicious of those who "gain immense power however and wherever fear is pedaled for their own aggrandizement," he can still pause to celebrate a rainy Valentine's Day with his wife, Marilyn, at Broadway Heights.

He ends with questions: "Who called me to be seduced by ambition?" "Who called me to discover the gift of adversity?" "Who calls me now that I, a season older, want far more than to silently expire from the starvation of an undernourished soul?"