A new literary arts organization, Rocky Mountain Reader, is working to connect writers and readers throughout Colorado.
It’s focused on uplifting stories about Colorado or written by Coloradans, according to publisher and editor, Kathryn Eastburn. Its board and contributors are a veritable who's who of longtime writers in the state.
Since Rocky Mountain Reader's debut in September 2024, their website has published more than 84 essays, book reviews, interviews and other literary endeavors.
KRCC’s Kendra Carr spoke with Rocky Mountain Reader creator, editor and publisher Kathryn Eastburn.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
KRCC's Kendra Carr: Tell me a little bit about the inspiration behind the creation of Rocky Mountain Reader.
Katheryn Eastburn: About 8 years ago I went to work in Mississippi, and I discovered a publication from Tennessee while I was living there called Chapter 16. They are dedicated to books by Tennessee authors, books about Tennessee, books set in Tennessee, literary things happening in Tennessee. And I thought, ‘I can do that in Colorado.'
I had written books while living in Colorado and found it was very hard to get the attention of publishers and readers out here in the literary wilderness. And I wondered if that was true for other writers.
One of the first things I found when I started looking around Colorado was the author Vauhini Vara, who, in her debut novel, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. I realized that very few people in Colorado realize that this heralded author lives here.
And I find that over and over, among poets, novelists, and people writing in many genres, Coloradans are not aware of the writers that live here. I think there's a great source for community building in that area. We are many things. We are a great outdoor paradise for sure, but we also are a literary place. We are a place where people care about books. Given technology, AI, and censorship efforts working toward the decline of serious reading, I think it's very important for us to know that we live in a place that values books.
KRCC: What goes into creating an organization like this?
Eastburn: I started looking into it during the pandemic. I contacted the editor and business manager at Chapter 16 and picked their brains. When I moved back here, I went to Colorado Humanities and pitched the idea. They chose to be our fiscal sponsor, which means I didn't have to jump through the hoops of gaining legal and tax exempt status. We operate under their 501c3 umbrella, but we have to raise all of our own funds. Fundraising initially kicked in and since spring of 2024, we've raised a little over $50,000 in private donations.
Then, it was about finding freelance writers, and they just came out of the woodwork. Within a very short time, I had a very steady stable of willing freelancers from all over the state who just love books. I found a lot of willing writers who just were so excited at the thought of writing about books and interviewing authors.
Another part of it is establishing relationships with publishers. And that's just the matter of doing a lot of research and reaching out to publicists saying, ‘We're here. This is what we write about. If a book crosses your desk that meets our criteria, please let me know.’ And that has turned out to be the easier part of this. Publishers are thrilled that we're here because most activity happens on the east and west coast. If you're an author in Colorado, it's much harder to get the word out in the media about your book than if you were in Brooklyn or LA or San Francisco or even Seattle. So, publishers are very happy we're here and that they have an outlet to promote their books.
KRCC: How are freelance authors chosen? What goes into that kind of a decision about who's going to publish?
Eastburn: Some I already knew and knew their writing. Basically I just asked people to do one sample review and I can tell whether they can do this on a weekly basis and hop around genres. We review everything; fantasy, mystery, literary fiction, poetry, biographies and memoir. So, our authors really need to be versatile as readers, as well as writers. But most of these people, a lot of them, came from newspapers.
KRCC: This is a fairly new project, but have you been introduced to a book through Rocky Mountain Reader that you might not otherwise have been introduced to?
Eastburn: Practically every single one of them, honestly. One I was introduced to has been nominated for a National Book Award and was praised in the Atlantic Monthly as one of the 10 books of 2024 that made us think. It's a memoir called "Whiskey Tender" by Deborah Taffa. She's an indigenous and Chicana woman who spent a lot of her childhood in Colorado and her father's native lands. It's a great memoir about dislocation, losing culture and getting it back, not knowing who you are and figuring it out. When I heard the book was partially located in Colorado, I asked someone to review it and then it just kept growing and becoming a well-known book around the country. Not because we reviewed it, but because it's a great book. And honestly, that experience happens to me almost every week.
KRCC: How do you see Rocky Mountain Reader evolving into the future?
Eastburn: I really like what it is right now. We publish five new reviews or features every week, 44 weeks a year. We take off the other eight weeks. I guess expanding programming is probably the one way I would like us to grow. Coming up with either a podcast or some other media to get the word out about us that we're here. Getting into more schools, having a closer relationship with libraries, connecting with book clubs and literary organizations, which Colorado is rich with literary organizations. I'm finding fiction writers, nonfiction writers, crime writers, western writers, eastern writers, northern writers, they all have their own organizations. So I just really want everybody around the state to know we're here.
The whole purpose is to connect readers and writers all over the state, even visitors to Colorado who are literary types. Anyone who wants to know where the good bookstores are, where readings are, we want to help with that kind of thing.
I want people to have a home, a hub where they can come and learn about what's happening in Colorado's literary arts landscape.
On self-published books:
Eastburn: If you have a book that you want us to take a look at, I'm the curator, and I'm happy to look at anything. When I first started doing this, I interviewed a publisher in Massachusetts named Carl Weber. He had a book called, "Why Books Still Matter", and he teaches at the Denver Publishing Institute. At the end, he said to me, ‘Publishing has changed so much, and there's so many books out there now, it's really hard to determine the quality of a lot of self-published, independently published material, but there's a whole lot of good stuff in that realm, and you need to figure out a way to find it.’
But what happened was I received a letter from a Denver author who had three books traditionally published. They sold well, but she was not satisfied with her publishing experience and she self-published her fourth book. She wrote to me and said, ‘I don't know if you'll consider reviewing this or not, but here's the story’. And we did.
I have found a lot of really good independently published work, including a recent review we had of a novel called Transference by a Colorado Springs author. It's a sci-fi, I guess, sort of a post-apocalyptic sci-fi piece. It's superb. So, I don't want anybody out there to think that their book has to come from Penguin Random House to be reviewed.
