Last Friday, the 21st annual Pikes Peak Writers' Conference kicked off at the Marriott Hotel. It was a three-day sojourn through the most pressing questions and dilemmas writers encounter while trying to break out as an artist.

For those unfamiliar with the Pikes Peak Writers, since 1993 it has proven to be an invaluable resource for aspiring writers throughout the Pikes Peak region and, according to its website, its conference has been ranked in the Top 10 by Writer's Digest. The pearls dropped here are one hell of an insight into the business of writing.

I was fortunate enough to sit through a couple of sessions on the Friday's agenda. The first was a presentation from Chris Myers — author of Lennon's Jinx and Date with the Dead — on terms for new writers to know, terms like "elevator pitch."

As one unfamiliar with the business end of writing, I immediately pictured someone throwing a fastball into a stainless-steel elevator — wrong. It works more like this: Imagine being in an elevator with a literary agent. How succinctly can you pitch your book to him or her before the elevator reaches its destination? Like other people who get so tangled up in complexities of plot and character that they haven't wrapped the whole thing up in a neat ball, I'd never looked at it that way.

Following Myers, romance author Lisa Renée Jones took the mic to talk about some of the more enlightening topics I ran across: how to find the right agent, and how they should never count out self-published works. While most emerging writers cringe at those two hyphenated works, Jones, on the other hand, was super optimistic about this information, saying, "The reality is most agents aren't always willing to take a risk on brand-new authors with no following."

Beyond her words, the thing that struck me the most about Jones' hour-long session was how palpably one could sense her journey towards artistry, just really feeling the years of frustration pouring through her voice and facial expressions. She didn't become a best-selling author overnight, but grinded away at her business and craft for several years before anyone took notice. It's people like these that are invited to the PPWC's conference every year to show writers the rocky road to success. To my mind, this knowledge is beyond worth the price of admission.

In the meantime, PPW holds monthly meetings at Lofty's on the fourth Monday of every month; free Write Brain workshops, also monthly; and open critiques the third Wednesday of every month at Cottonwood Center for the Arts.

Voices of the Pacific: Untold Stories from the Marine Heroes of World War II, the latest novel to capture stories from those that served in the Pacific theater of World War II, was released in hardcover earlier this month.

Early reviews report an appreciation for allowing the subjects to speak for themselves — essentially in oral history format.

The book's Colorado-based author Adam Makos will hold a reading and book signing at 3 p.m., Saturday, April 20 at the Briargate Barnes & Noble location.

From the publicist, here's the book's breakdown:

VOICES OF THE PACIFIC: Untold Stories from the Marine Heroes of World War II (Berkley Caliber Hardcover Original; $27.95) chronicles the United States Marine Corps’ actions in the Pacific Theater of Operations within the wider war, presenting the true stories of heroism and honor as told by such World War II veterans as Sid Phillips, R.V. Bergin, and Chuck Tatum—whose exploits were featured in the HBO® mini-series, The Pacific—and many other surviving Marines.

When Makos and Brotherton interviewed the marines who appear in this book, the two authors made them a promise: they could tell it as it was. No need to mask the horrors of war with humor, or to skip over certain memories in favor of light-hearted tales of brotherhood. With unflinching honesty, these men reveal harrowing accounts of combat with an implacable enemy, the friendships and camaraderie they found—and lost—within their companies, and the aftermath of the war’s impact on their lives.

These are the words of men who live in our communities, who’ve raised their children alongside our own, who’ve shopped in our stores, shared a drink with us. How did they return to a life of normalcy after what they saw, after what they heard, suffered, did? Readers will be asking themselves, what are these remarkable men made of?

With unprecedented access to the veterans and their families, never-before-seen photographs, and unpublished memoirs, Makos and Brotherton have created with VOICES OF THE PACIFIC an incredible historic record of American bravery and sacrifice.

Though co-author Marcus Brotherton won't be in attendance, two Colorado Springs-based veterans from the war will be.

Here's a little more on them:

• Frank "Doc" Evans was born and raised in Texas before joining the Navy in 1942. He arrived in the Pacific Theater and was assigned as a medical corpsman to the legendary 1st Marine Division during the campaign for the island of New Britian in 1943. On Sept. 15, 1944, "Doc" hit the beaches of Peleliu with the 1st Marine Regiment commanded by the legendary, Lewis "Chesty" Puller. As a medic, "Doc" attended to more than his share of casualties when his unit suffered greater than 70% losses on Peleleu and was withdrawn from combat.
Doc left the Navy in 1946 and worked until retirement in the TV business as a technician, most recently for Channel 9 News in Denver. He is a long time resident of Colorado Springs, Colorado

• Air Force Colonel William "Bill" Roche was born in Lexington, Kentucky and enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Forces in June 1943. He was made a gunner on heavy bombers and deployed to England in November 1944 to serve with the legendary 8th Air Force as a B-17 bomber's waist gunner with the 452nd Bomb Group.
In combat over Europe, Bill was shot down twice. Once his bomber crash landed in France and he was able to evade capture and return to service. The second time he was shot down behind enemy lines and made his way to Soviet-occupied Poland. After the war, Bill served with the USAF for over 32 years and retired as a Colonel. He later went to work for the CIA then served as a language professor at the Air Force Academy. Bill remains a long time resident of Colorado Springs, Colorado.

After his son, Erik, was killed by Las Vegas police in July 2010, Springs resident William Scott turned to his profession as a writer to convey his frustration and the pain of losing his son.

We told his story here, here and here, and now his book, The Permit, has been released.

It's available here and here, as well as from other e-book sellers.

A recent press release about the book says:

The murder of a beloved son, a quest for truth and justice usurped by a broken legal system, and the battle with both grief and a blatant cover-up, led author William B. Scott to create a fictional tale rooted in every parent’s nightmare. The result is The Permit, a compelling techno-thriller novel based on the real-world murder of Erik Scott, who was gunned down by Las Vegas Metropolitan Police officers in front of a suburban Costco store in July 2010.

“My son, Erik, was murdered, because a BlackBerry in his hand was mistaken for a firearm. That senseless tragedy was magnified by a transparent cover-up orchestrated to protect his killers and a Cartel of Corruption that controls Las Vegas,” said William B. Scott, bestselling author and Erik Scott’s father. “When it became apparent that the traditional ‘legal’ process was failing my family, I turned to an effective asymmetric-warfare vehicle for revealing truth: Entertainment. A story that blended fact and fiction would expose the Cartel by showcasing its brutal methods and warped objectives. It’s a proven tool called ‘Justice through Fiction.’

It's not Scott's first book. The former flight test engineer and aerospace journalist has authored books about space warfare, which we reported on earlier.

Lots of book news in my inbox recently.

• According to Publisher's Weekly, author Marie Lu, to whom we introduced to you here in March, will launch a Facebook game in December called Cities of Legend. It's based on her debut novel, Legend. The second book in her trilogy, Prodigy, will release in January.

• The Colorado Center for the Book is now accepting entries for the Colorado Book Awards. Per the release:

The Colorado Book Awards recognize the best books by Colorado authors, editors, publishers, illustrators and photographers published in 2012. Look for information on our Finalist Event in the spring. Winners will be recognized at the annual Colorado Book Awards held in Aspen in June 2013.

Eligible books include any work published by a Colorado author, illustrator, editor, publisher or photographer, and include hardcover, paperback and e-published books. All entry forms should be submitted online, but payment and copies can be provided online or through surface mail. Past categories have included: anthology, biography, children's literature, creative nonfiction, fiction, genre fiction, history, juvenile literature, nonfiction, pictorial, poetry, and young adult. It is acceptable to submit your own work.

For more information on how to submit, or to recommend a book published in 2012, please visit coloradohumanities.org or contact Christine Goff at goff@coloradohumanities.org or 303.894.7951 x21.

• Left Coast Crime, the annual mystery/crime/thriller writing conference sponsored by the Rocky Mountain Chapter of Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime, will be held in Colorado Springs in 2013. The Cheyenne Mountain Resort will host the four-day event from March 21-24. Keynote speakers include New York Times bestselling authors Craig Johnson and Laura Lippman. Learn more here.

• Registration is now open for the 21st annual Pikes Peak Writers Conference. Keynotes for this year's April 19-21 event at the Marriott include Libba Bray, Barry Eisler, David Liss and Amber Benson. Learn more about both the conference and the hosting organization, Pikes Peak Writers, here.

From the listings desk: People were so tough back in the day. Before OTC N-SAIDS, before modern psychotherapy, before much of anything, people just had to suffer.

But not unwillingly.

They tried, doing the best they could with what they had, and while we scoff or pity certain methods or medical attitudes today, it's not the whole story. See, for instance, what clean, dry air did to tuberculosis, and by extension, what the consumption cure did to foster our fair city. (And just think how barbaric our treatments will look a mere 75 years from now.)

That's just my take on it, but for a truly researched approach, pick up a copy of the brand new Doctors, Disease, and Dying in the Pikes Peak Region by John Stansfield. The book, released by the Pikes Peak Library District's Special Collections Department, delves into "tales of the pioneers, traders, and military personnel who were both the purveyors and the recipients of needed care," as well as "the women and men who practiced medicine in this region, discussions about internationally significant developments for the treatment of tuberculosis and cancer, the impacts of epidemics on the community, mental health issues, and poverty."

The book will be officially released tomorrow at a party at the Carnegie Reading Room at the Penrose Library (20 N. Cascade Ave.) beginning at 2 p.m. Along with the signing and requisite refreshments, Stansfield and PPLD staff will perform a reader's theater playlet of "The Widow's Herd," which is based on a story by Dr. Charles Fox Gardiner.

Copies of the book are available for $24.95, but will be 15 percent off at the event, which is free and no RSVPs are required.

For another book on all things medical and western, click here.

If you read this week's cover story on Jason Lewis, you might have noticed that the timing was inspired, in part, by Lewis' book release.

Typically when we run book-related stories, they show up as a Fine Print feature, with short book reviews attached.

Well, "Lewis and the arc" grew into a larger feature, and, as such, our Short Stories this month have a found a home here, on the IndyBlog.

The Dog Stars
Peter Heller
Knopf, $24.95/hardcover
Hig and his dog Jasper have survived the super-flu apocalypse by almost a decade in their corner of a tiny Colorado airport, shared with well-armed prepper Bangley and Hig’s 1956 Cessna. Hig’s learned to not think too much — about the past, his dead wife, or the people they’ve killed to stay safe, only some of whom were actually a threat. But one more loss sends him flying out in search of an airport radio that he might have heard, once, four years ago. When 99.7 percent of the people are dead, how can one decent man start living again? Heller answers that question with Hig, a man who’s going to fly until he finds something worth loving. While the apocalypse itself is to be feared, this book finds the core of humanity that we can only hope will be left afterward, however frightened we may be. — Kel Munger

Spike: A Dark Place (Part One)
Victor Gischler
Dark Horse, $2.99/comic book
It was Spike who delivered my favorite Buffy the Vampire Slayer quote ever: “Love isn’t brains, children, it’s blood. Blood screaming inside you to work its will. I may be love’s bitch, but at least I’m man enough to admit it.” And now said vampire loverboy is headed to the dark side of the moon on a spaceship with human-sized cockroach minions, still heartsick over Buffy, to kick-off this five-part miniseries. (Issue 2 released this week.) Spike’s humor is standalone entertaining, but to get your bearings, a back-read of the BVS Season 8 and 9 comics, which lead off where the TV show ended, is helpful. While Avengers movie and BVS mastermind Joss Whedon plays the executive producer role here, Marvel comic regular Victor Gischler scripts this space jaunt with fun, fulfilling pen and ink work by Paul Lee and Andy Owens respectively. — Matthew Schniper

Alone With the Past: The Life and Photographic Art of Roland W. Reed
Ernest R. Lawrence
Afton Press, hardcover/$45
There’s no Wikipedia page for Roland Reed. Even his grave, which lies right here in Evergreen Cemetery, is unmarked. It’s sad, considering that Reed’s life work — photographing various Native American nations in the U.S. — is pretty much on par with that of his more famous contemporary, Edward Sheriff Curtis. Like Curtis, Reed oscillated between artistic photographer and anthropological documentarian. That line is even blurrier given the way he posed his photos; however, standards of study have changed too, and Reed’s sensitive approach to the Objiway, Navajo and Hopi nations (to name a few) are still remarkable. Enter Alone With the Past: The Life and Photographic Art of Roland W. Reed, a compendium of Reed’s photos, letters and commercial ephemera. Reed’s work really sings come Chapter 5, “The People of the Southwest.” His stark, bold photographs of people and the majestic Canyon de Chelly landscape exemplify his ability to capture wide-scale grandeur, like abandoned cliff dwellings, or small, contemplative moments in a simple, stunning portrait. — Edie Adelstein

A few book-related activities going on:

First up, on Saturday, June 2, photojournalist Steven Clevenger will host a signing and presentation on his book America's First Warriors: Native Americans and Iraq.

You can listen to a 2011 NPR interview with Clevenger, who's been covering wars for almost four decades, and see a slideshow of his work here. Then head to Poor Richard's Bookstore from 5 to 7 p.m. on Saturday to meet the man.

Next up, local author Robert Spiller is running a deal on the Kindle version of Radical Equations, the fourth book in his Bonnie Pinkwater mystery series.

Starting Friday, Radical Equations will be available online here for just 99 cents. If you're looking for a light, summer read, this series featuring a high school math teacher (written by a former math teacher) with multiple Colorado references might be just what you need. Now's a good time to check out this series, since Spiller is plugging away on the fifth book, Napier's Bones, and plans to release it in 2013.

Third, for those of you with kiddos, Pikes Peak Library District's summer reading program starts June 1 and runs through July 31. Learn more about how your children can win prizes, just for reading, here.

And finally, less book-related though still library-involved, PPLD now has the first season of the PBS hit Downton Abbey available to card-holders, for free. Learn more here. The video-loaning is a part of the library's OverDrive Virtual collection, which includes not only video, but eBooks and audio books.

Care to join me in a spot of summer speed-reading?

This morning brought the announcement that The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood is the official pick for All Pikes Peak Reads 2012. The powerhouse author, famed for her engaging public appearances and devoted fan base, will be visiting Colorado Springs for the Sept. 14 kickoff of APPR.

Some readers will have already started hyperventilating with excitement at this point, while others (like me) will be casting their minds back to high school book reports on Atwood’s dystopian classic The Handmaid’s Tale. Sure, it was topical and preachy, but it was a blisteringly good story with lots of crunchy plot and themes that kept haunting us for weeks. Atwood has perfected her M.O. since then — her 2000 novel The Blind Assassin won the Man Booker Prize — but the experience remains much the same. Where Tale creates a dark thrill ride out of Reagan-era social politics, Flood tangles with our current vision of the apocalypse: environmental collapse.

In keeping with All Pikes Peak Reads criteria, The Year of the Flood combines broad appeal and easy readability for readers as young as 12, while incorporating themes relevant to the Pikes Peak region and a plot suitable for stage adaptation.

In true Atwood fashion, it also happens to be set in a little-too-near future in which human error has set off a cataclysmic disaster that has changed the fabric of life as we know it. For fans of a certain post-apocalyptic blockbuster novel-turned-film, that’s standard fare, but where Suzanne Collins titillates and terrifies, Atwood tends to prefer to galvanize and provoke.

Or put it a brighter way — she’s out to get us thinking and acting for positive change.

The Year of the Flood is tied to this year’s nonfiction and teen selections (see below) by the theme of survival, a more positive bookend to the annual PPLD Regional History Symposium’s theme of disaster.

The most compelling stories to come out of disaster are those of survival, says PPLD executive director Paula Miller. “And not only survival, but finding ways to thrive.”

For residents of the Pikes Peak region, Miller says, the biggest touchstone for these themes is the environment. “Sustainability has hit this community in a big way,” she said at the announcement ceremony this morning, where winners and sponsors of the city’s Sustainability Snapshot Contest, including SunShare, Old Town Bike Shop, Greener Corners and the Southern Colorado Clean Cities Coalition, were also honored.

As All Pikes Peak Reads takes off this fall, the library district will be partnering with several local environment- and sustainability-focused organizations, including the Trails and Open Space Coalition and the Pikes Peak Sustainable Business Network, to explore the ways local residents can thrive in caring for their community, as a community. A complete schedule of All Pikes Peak Reads 2012 events will be published this fall in the Indy and on PPLD’s website.

In the meantime, we’ll need all the head start we can get to digest Atwood’s 40-plus works of fiction, poetry and critique before she hits town in September. Grab your spot on the library holds list while you can!

2012 All Pikes Peak Reads
September 14 - October 31, 2012

The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood
Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer (teen selection)
The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford (children's selection)
The Unthinkable by Amanda Ripley (nonfiction selection)