Books like Hatter Fox

The child’s immersion into nature is a most relevant theme for me as an environmental educator, but it is critical to America as a whole. Our future depends upon it. We continue to live in a culture that shoves nature into the background, something viewed as pleasant scenery but not truly interactive in our lives. The “store” has become the source of things to many young people. The current generation of American parents is not equipped to teach children about nature and its indelible place in our survival as a species; therefore, books must become surrogates in this mission. 

I’ve always loved dark, thought-provoking tear-jerkers, the way they challenge my mind and elicit powerful emotions. Maybe it’s because I grew up in an age when men couldn’t cry or show emotions. Maybe it’s because I lived such a happy-go-lucky childhood, hiking through woods and catching lizards and turtles, that I grew curious about the darker aspects of life. It could be how I cope with having fought for two years on the front lines of combat and why I found myself in a philosopher’s classroom, studying ethics. All I know is that my heart craves powerful, dark stories that make my eyes leak.

As a child in Oklahoma and Texas during the 1960s and 1970s, I remember being told two things: “Oklahoma is OK” and “The Eyes of Texas” were upon me. My grandparents and great-grandparents helped carve the new state of Oklahoma out of nothing within the span of only a few years. For a long time, I accepted the party line, but as an adult, I realized I wasn’t—the picture was incomplete. Underneath the inspiring tales of grit and heroism was something darker. That’s a big part of what my writing is about.

I’m just a guy, a normal guy who enjoys thinking and writing about things that can nudge humanity along towards peace. If everybody thought just a little bit about it, we’d have it.

I’m Alex Behr, a writer and musician. When I was little, I thought the Partridge Family lived in the TV set. I soon joined the Partridge Family Fan Club, entranced with the puppy-dog beauty of David Cassidy. Although he appealed to teenyboppers, he could write dark songs. Check out “I Think I Love You”: “Before I go insane, I hold my pillow to my head / … Screaming out the words I dread.” Eventually, I left David behind but continued being a fangirl of both intense musicians and fictional characters. Reading about obsessions is a vicarious pleasure that crosses genres from rock memoirs to literary fiction. 

I have published seven books, all set in the West, including an anthology, West of 98: Living and Writing the New American West, that features writers from every state west of the Mississippi. For four years now, I have been doing a podcast called Breakfast in Montana, where my partner Aaron Parrett and I discuss Montana books. I also published a book in 2016 called 56 Counties, where I traveled to every county in Montana and interviewed people about what it means to live in this state. So I have a good feel for the people of this region and for the books they love. 

Reproductive justice – reproductive rights – reproductive self-determination – this has been my passion for decades. I’m a historian. The most important thing I’ve learned is how reproductive bodies have always been racialized in the United States, from 1619 to the present day. Circumstances and tactics have changed over time, but lawmakers and others have always valued the reproduction of some people while degrading the reproduction of people defined as less valuable – or valueless – to the nation. Throughout our history, reproductive politics has been at the center of public life.  As we see today. I keep writing because I want more and more of us to understand where we are – and why. 

I have been a dance teacher all of my adult life, and a poetry and word-lover even longer. I love the economy of language, immediacy, and the promise of surprise in poetry. In middle age, I returned to writing just as my body began its slow rebellion, with the added shifts of remarriage and step-parenting a severely disabled son. I went back to grad school and wrote my first book, drawing on the experience of confronting change, just as these recommended poets have done. Each of these poets has a very different story, but what they have in common outweighs their differences, and because of that we are able to see ourselves in their writing.

I grew up in Michigan where I was outdoors in the woods most of the time, running around with my imaginary friends. I built an entire world in my imagination where girls and women were powerful and ruled the world. I wrote stories about that world, and I’ve never stopped writing or reading myths, folklore, and fairy tales. Stories are the best way to bring the mythic and hidden realms of our existence out into the open. When I catch a glimpse of other worlds through storytelling, it always feels healing. It gives me hope that there is more to our existence than what we ordinarily see.

In 1971, when I graduated from law school, I received a fellowship to help staff a Legal Aid office on the Rosebud Sioux Indian Reservation in South Dakota. I lived there for nearly four years, representing tribal members in tribal, state, and federal courts. I then worked for 45 years on the National Legal Staff of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). One of my major responsibilities was helping Indian tribes and their members protect and enforce their rights, and I filed numerous cases on their behalf. During that time, I taught Federal Indian Law for more than 20 years and also published The Rights of Indians and Tribes.