Here are 66 books that Secret Denver fans have personally recommended if you like
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A few years ago, I began rediscovering my hometown of Denver as I walked neighborhoods and revisited landmarks of the city that I had not seen since I was a kid. Essential Denver highlights the fabulous things the city offers from my perspective as a Denver native. I encourage readers to explore Denver, plan outings, and become involved in the community. I hope this Denver book list sparks more interest in landmarks, treasures, and the history of Denver to ensure the city’s future is strong and vital.
As the title indicates, history lovers will enjoy this book. I appreciated the short, easy-to-read entries. It was a well-written book with excellent photography. The author Mark Barnhouse is a Denver native and has published six history books on Denver. As a result of his experience, this book is of high-quality and polished.
Founded in an unlikely spot where dry prairies meet formidable mountains, Denver overcame its doubtful beginning to become the largest and most important city within a thousand miles. This tour of the Queen City of the Plains goes beyond travel guidebooks to explore its fascinating historical sites in detail. Tour the grand Victorian home where the unsinkable Molly Brown lived prior to her Titanic voyage. Visit the Brown Palace Hotel suite that President Dwight and First Lady Mamie Eisenhower used as the "Summer White House." Pay respects at the mountaintop grave of the greatest showman of the nineteenth century, Colonel…
The dragons of Yuro have been hunted to extinction.
On a small, isolated island, in a reclusive forest, lives bandit leader Marani and her brother Jacks. With their outlaw band they rob from the rich to feed themselves, raiding carriages and dodging the occasional vindictive…
A few years ago, I began rediscovering my hometown of Denver as I walked neighborhoods and revisited landmarks of the city that I had not seen since I was a kid. Essential Denver highlights the fabulous things the city offers from my perspective as a Denver native. I encourage readers to explore Denver, plan outings, and become involved in the community. I hope this Denver book list sparks more interest in landmarks, treasures, and the history of Denver to ensure the city’s future is strong and vital.
An outstanding history book of Denver filled with interesting details. Short enough not to bore me. Detailed enough to grasp the significant events, people, buildings, and aspects of Denver that give it a well-rounded and thorough view. Well organized and researched. This book is a treasure for Denver's history. I applaud and appreciate the authors for putting their knowledge and research into the hands of the public is such an easy-to-read book form.
A Short History of Denver covers more than 150 years of Denver's rich history. The book recounts the takeover of Native American lands, the founding of small towns on the South Platte River at the base of the Rocky Mountains, and the creation of a city, which by 1890 was among the nation's major western urban centers. Leonard and Noel tell the stories of powerful economic and political leaders such as John Evans, Horace Tabor, and David Moffat, and delve into the contributions of women, including Elizabeth Byers and Margaret (Molly) Brown. The book also recognizes the importance of the…
A few years ago, I began rediscovering my hometown of Denver as I walked neighborhoods and revisited landmarks of the city that I had not seen since I was a kid. Essential Denver highlights the fabulous things the city offers from my perspective as a Denver native. I encourage readers to explore Denver, plan outings, and become involved in the community. I hope this Denver book list sparks more interest in landmarks, treasures, and the history of Denver to ensure the city’s future is strong and vital.
I had fun learning more about Denver by walking. I decided to take 32 different friends or family members on the 32 different walks outlined in the book. It was a great way to spend time outdoors in conversation and exploration. It is fabulous if you are new to Denver or if you want to rediscover the city where you have lived for a long time.
Get to Know Denver’s Most Vibrant and Historic Neighborhoods
People come to Denver for the nearby mountains and spectacular natural beauty, the outdoor lifestyle and mild climate with abundant sunshine. They also discover a city that’s ideal for exploring on foot. Become an urban adventurer! Mindy Sink guides you through 32 unique walking tours in this comprehensive guide to the best sights and sites that Denver has to offer―with insider advice on where to dine, have a drink, and shop. Enjoy routes that showcase diverse neighborhoods and spectacular natural beauty, all in one of America’s most walkable cities. Discover Denver’s…
When Annie Thornton, midwife and apprentice witch, falls through time to a 15th-century Yorkshire village with her telepathic cat, Rosamund, she befriends Will and Jack, two soldiers returning from the French Wars. Mistress Meg, Annie’s ancestral aunt living in the 15th century, is…
A few years ago, I began rediscovering my hometown of Denver as I walked neighborhoods and revisited landmarks of the city that I had not seen since I was a kid. Essential Denver highlights the fabulous things the city offers from my perspective as a Denver native. I encourage readers to explore Denver, plan outings, and become involved in the community. I hope this Denver book list sparks more interest in landmarks, treasures, and the history of Denver to ensure the city’s future is strong and vital.
I like reading about Denver's history, but I love seeing pictures bring that history to life. This book shows old pictures of buildings and compares them with the present-day look. In some cases, beautiful old buildings no longer exist or have been drastically altered. This is a great coffee table book.
Celebrating America's favorite cityscapes, this series combines historic interest and contemporary beauty. Then and Now features fascinating archival photographs contrasted with specially commissioned, full-color images of the same scene today. A visual lesson in the historic changes of our greatest urban landscapes.
I recall the exact moment when my interest sparked about frontier prostitution and Denver’s underbelly — a friend mentioned the ‘bad blood’ in her family — an ancestor who was a second-rate madam and who employed her own daughters. The quest started. Who were these women, and why did they make the choices they did? I’ve spent years chasing down traces of the old west’s prostitutes, fascinated by their identities and lives. The west had opportunities for women who were willing to take chances. As a fifth-generation Coloradoan, I hoped to capture the story of these enterprising and overlooked women, their lives, and the world around them.
This is a no-holds-barred account of prostitution in Denver’s Market Street district with all the accompanying Wild West behavior this implies. Secrest’s account is well researched, the photographs are fascinating, and it brings the seedy side of old Denver back to life! Be prepared for rather graphic descriptions of “the trade” replete with accounts of alcohol, drugs, and varying forms of violence and crime. A must-read for people interested in Denver’s History, the Wild West, or frontier prostitution.
This updated and revised edition of Hell's Belles takes the reader on a soundly researched, well-documented, and amusing journey back to the early days of Denver. Clark Secrest details the evolution of Denver's prostitution, the gambling, the drug addicts, and the corrupt politicians and police who, palms outstretched, allowed it all to happen. Also included in Hell's Belles is a biography of one of Denver's original police officers, Sam Howe, upon whose crime studies the book is based.
The popular veneer of Denver's present-day Market Street - its fancy bars, posh restaurants, and Coors Field - is stripped away to…
I’m a writer fascinated by landscape and history—and the American West is my magnet. I’ve set three books in the West. I can’t get enough of the place. An entire national myth is enshrined “where the deer and the antelope play.” Independence. Freedom from the past. Land we can supposedly call our own. The West is so beautiful and also so scarred. I love to read books that deepen my experience of the deserts, mountains, and rivers. I also love to learn about the people who were here before me, those who have hung on, and those who hope to heal the scars. These books are great stories about a bewitching place.
Fajardo-Anstine does many remarkable things in Woman of Light, but three of those things just blew me away. First, she anchors the novel in a city (Denver, 1930s). Cities are the forgotten truth of the American West, and they shouldn’t be. Second, she brings to life the “Lost Territories,” the Hispanic/Indigenous lands of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico, long-cherished homes overrun by white settlement in the 19th century. Third, she builds the entire compelling narrative around a suite of Chicana/Indigenous women—and they are the strongest, liveliest characters you’ll ever meet. They work, they love, they breathe loyalty, they seek justice. This novel is a stylish eye-opener from start to finish. And it’ll forever change what you think you know about the region.
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A “dazzling, cinematic, intimate, lyrical” (Roxane Gay) epic of betrayal, love, and fate that spans five generations of an Indigenous Chicano family in the American West, from the author of the National Book Award finalist Sabrina & Corina
“Sometimes you just step into a book and let it wash over you, like you’re swimming under a big, sparkling night sky.”—Celeste Ng, author of Little Fires Everywhere and Everything I Never Told You
A PHENOMENAL BOOK CLUB PICK AND AN AUDACIOUS BOOK CLUB PICK
There is one every generation, a seer who keeps the stories.
Chasing Light is a lyrical meditation on grief, memory, and the fragile beauty of everyday life. At its core, it is a story of resilience, forgiveness, and the transformational power of human connection. It sheds light on the overlooked realities of homelessness and addiction, while emphasizing the importance of compassion…
All of my novels explore, in some way, how the characters are affected by trauma or loss, and how they respond to these difficulties over time. This comes partly from my impatience with the notion of “closure” and with the idea that we can ever truly find it after a traumatic event or a significant loss. I’m drawn to fiction and nonfiction that doesn’t shy away from the messiness of finding a way to live with these difficulties, or trying to. In addition to writing fiction, I’ve spent nearly ten years recommending novels and story collections through my Small Press Picks website.
I love the complex, nuanced way in which this novel explores the long-range consequences of a single tragedy: in the case of this book, the death of a young man who was on the edge of becoming a father. As we enter the perspectives of his sister, the mother of his child, and (in later years) his child, we learn how lives can be rebuilt in the aftermath of a loss, a time when survivors can feel hopelessly broken. We also learn how new—and sometimes unexpected—bonds can be formed. In other words, we see that tragedies can leave more than darkness in their wake. I took hope from this book, and it provided a refreshing perspective, especially in these troubling times.
Melanie Henderson's life is a lie. The scandal of her birth and the identity of her true parents is kept from her family's small, conservative Colorado town. Not even she knows the truth: that her birth mother was just 14 and unmarried to her father, a local boy who drowned when he tried to take a shortcut across an icy river. Thirty-five years later, in Denver, Melanie dabbles in affairs with married men while clinging to a corporate job that gives her life order even as her tenuous relationships fall apart. She still hasn't learned that the woman who raised…
For the last 19 years, I have worked narcotics K-9s for a private company called Sherlock Hounds Detection Canines. I recently retired from the K-9 work, but over the years, I loved seeing how dogs solve crimes in real life. Not only do they help us solve crimes, but dogs have a way of reaching people and changing lives. Dogs are quite literally “man’s (or woman’s) best friend,” and because of that, they become the best partners for many characters in books. There’s nothing better than discovering a new K-9 series that depicts the real-life love and bond between K-9 and handler.
I was excited to read another book with fascinating characters and of course, a great K-9. Nickless’ characters are well-developed and very believable. Her fictional K-9 Clyde is captivating and while he’s technically retired, still has the skillset to help his handler, Sydney Parnell.
I love the character arc with Sydney in each book as she recovers from the traumas of serving in the military. I also love that Nickless had Sydney return home to Denver to work as a railroad police special agent. This is a law enforcement job that I haven’t seen in any other book. I appreciated the thrilling storyline and how Nickless created strong tension that ratcheted up to a suspenseful ending.
A young woman is found brutally murdered, and the main suspect is the victim's fiance, a hideously scarred Iraq War vet known as the Burned Man. But railroad police Special Agent Sydney Rose Parnell, brought in by the Denver Major Crimes unit to help investigate, can't shake the feeling that larger forces are behind this apparent crime of passion.
In the depths of an icy winter, Parnell and her K9 partner, Clyde-both haunted by their time in Iraq-descend into the underground world of a savage gang of rail riders. There, they uncover a wide-reaching conspiracy and…
I was a computer programmer (BA and MA in math) for several organizations, including NASA and the Savannah River Ecology Lab before retirement, went to the Clarion and Tulane SF&F Workshops, and read the slush pile for Amazing/Fantastic. I’ve done a lot of theatre as actor and lighting tech, have always liked to hike in the woods, have written 11 novels (including 3 published SF novels), had 5 plays given full production, and have 2 CDs of my original songs. In my copious spare time, I sleep.
LaFarge’s first novel, Laughing Boy, about the love affair between a reservation Indian and one who had been raised in a religious school, won the 1930 Pulitzer Prize. LaFarge spent much of his life fighting for Native American rights, sometimes in the “dark of Washington.” I wanted to grow up to be an Indian. I still do.
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize: “A romantic idyll played out in the rhythms and meanings of a vanished Navajo world.” —The Denver Post
Laughing Boy is a model member of his tribe. Raised in old traditions, skilled in silver work, and known for his prowess in the wild horse races, he does the Navajos of T’o Tlakai proud. But times are changing. It is 1914, and the first car has just driven into their country. Then, Laughing Boy meets Slim Girl—and despite her “American” education and the warnings of his family, he gives in to desire and marries her.
Portrait of an Artist as a Young Woman
by
Alexis Krasilovsky,
Kate from Jules et Jim meets I Love Dick.
A young woman filmmaker’s journey of self-discovery, set against a backdrop of the sexual liberation movement of the 1970s and 1980s. In Portrait of an Artist as a Young Woman, we follow Ana Fried as she faces the ultimate…
I am a Northern Irish crime writer. I worship storytellers, no matter if the stories are relayed on the page, the screen, or in songs. As long as the stories come across as real, then I am happy.
I, as a storyteller, endeavor to be more of a "camera" than a “writer.” I believe it’s all there waiting for me, and as a “camera,” I am allowed to go deep into myself and record all that my imagination is producing. I believe all the books I have selected have helped me in some small way understand why some of us can commit crimes while others can’t.
This time the detective whose shoes I am allowed to tread in are those of Cliff Janeway, a Denver Homicide detective, investigating the murder of a local rare books scout.
I grew to know what it feels like to be a detective. To someone like myself - who prefers to pick up my rare first editions, not on the internet but by rummaging around for hours in bookstores - this and the other titles in John Donning's atmospheric Janeway titles are pure mana from heaven.
The author ran the Old Algonquin Bookstore in Denver for a decade. Mr. Donning's writing voice is so authentic, I have to keep reminding myself that Janeway is the detective and not the author.
"A joy to read for its wealth of inside knowledge about the antiquarian book business and its eccentric traders." -The New York Times Book Review
In the bestselling first novel of the Cliff Janeway bibliomystery series, former Denver homicide detective Cliff Janeway trades his badge for a bookstore-and quickly finds that rare books and murder make a volatile mix.
Janeway, a tough, book-loving cop with a penchant for collecting rare first editions, becomes obsessed with the death of local book scout Bobby Westfall-a gentle loner with a sharp eye for valuable volumes. When the lead suspect slips through the cracks…
