Two Former Fellows Win Colorado Book Awards

By Wendy Worrall Redal

With more than 400 guests looking on, former Ted Scripps Fellows David Baron and Daniel Glick were honored with Colorado Book Awards on Nov. 18, 2004. The 13th annual gala, sponsored by the Colorado Center for the Book, took place at Denver's Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum. Fifteen winners, all Colorado authors, were recognized in 14 categories. Each of the books was published in 2003.

Baron's book, The Beast in the Garden: A Modern Parable of Man and Nature, tied for first place in the Colorado and the West category. Glick won the History/Biography category with Monkey Dancing: A Father, Two Kids and a Journey to the Ends of the Earth, and Tom Yulsman, co-director of the Center for Environmental Journalism and long-time science writer, was a finalist in the Non-Fiction category for Origins: The Quest for Our Cosmic Roots, his account of the emergence of the universe and life within it.

The Beast in the Garden (W.W. Norton), a study of the complex interaction between mountain lions and humans in Colorado's rapidly growing Front Range foothills, grew out of Baron's fellowship project while he was at the CEJ from 1998-1999. He became fascinated with the big cats and the problems that ensue when predators and people begin to find themselves in close proximity.

"Obviously, I was thrilled to receive a book award, but I was especially thrilled to receive a Colorado Book Award," Baron said.

"When I was writing my book, I wondered how Coloradans would react to it. Would they feel I portrayed the state's history, culture, and landscape accurately? Would they embrace the book as a welcome addition to Colorado literature, or reject it as the work of an 'outsider'? I like to think that receiving the award is a sign that the book has been embraced, and that means a lot to me since I've embraced Colorado as my new home."

The Beast in the Garden has just been released in paperback.

Glick's winning title, Monkey Dancing (Public Affairs), is the saga of the 5-month trip around the world he took with his two children in 2001 following the departure of their mother to another relationship in another state, and the death of Glick's brother to cancer. With his world turned awry, Glick decided to reconstitute his family anew with an adventurous itinerary to some of the earth's most remote and threatened natural places. Monkey Dancing chronicles their physical and emotional journey.

A special delight for Glick, who was a fellow in 2000-2001, was that his 13-year-old daughter Zoe was present to accept the award with him. (Son Kolya was studying abroad in Australia at the time.)

"It was so much fun to have her on the platform with me," said Glick. "It was kind of a dual pleasure to get the recognition and be there with Zoe was who was such an integral part of the experience."

Glick's first book, Powder Burn (Public Affairs), was a 2002 Colorado Book Award finalist but did not win. "I was a bridesmaid, but this time I was a bride," he noted, adding, "I feel like I'm really a member of a community" among writers in Colorado, a state he has called home for 10 years.

Yulsman's Origins, one of three finalists in the Non-Fiction category, was edged out by best-selling author Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven.

As for future book award contenders, neither Baron nor Glick has immediate plans to write another book, while Yulsman has an idea in the works. Baron's new position as Global Development Editor for "The World," a public radio program co-produced by Boston's WGBH and the BBC, has put other book goals on hold for now. Glick, too, is at full capacity with magazine work. He is currently working on three natural-history-related articles for National Geographic and Smithsonian.

Yulsman is tentatively collaborating with CU geology professor Jim White on a book about how the Earth's life support systems, particularly climate, influenced human evolution, and how humans now dominate those systems. "We are thinking about a treatment that in its broad sweep would be something like Guns, Germs and Steel," said Yulsman, "but the treatment would be more journalistic."

In the meantime, Yulsman remains busy juggling teaching, heading up the news-editorial sequence in CU's School of Journalism and Mass Communication, co-directing the Center for Environmental Journalism, and freelancing for magazines on the side, when there is a 'side.'

For more details on each of these books, or to purchase them, go to: www.beastinthegarden.com, www.danielglick.net, or to www.amazon.com for Origins.