Happy New Year! This first Monday of 2021 finds me rolling along at 80 MPH with writing my book about Far West Texas and, concurrently, editing the Marfa Mondays Podcasting Project episode # 22 about Sanderson (listen in to the other 21 Marfa Mondays podcasts here). Those of you who follow this blog well know that I’ve been at work on this book and the related podcast series for a whale of a while. One of many reasons for that is, to quote J.P. Bryan, a past president of the Texas State Historical Association, “More books have been written about [Texas] than any state in the union. In fact, there are more books about Texas than all the rest of the states combined.” Having been reading intensively about Texas for some years now, I believe it.
Starting this year, 2021, I’ll be dedicating the first Monday of the month to sharing with you some of the more interesting books in my working library. This post features a trio of biographies, two recent, and one I’d call an oldie but yummie.
Michael Vinson’s Bluffing Texas Style: The Arsons, Forgeries, and High-Stakes Poker Capers of Rare Book Dealer Johnny Jenkins (University of Oklahoma Press, 2020).
Splendidly well-written and deeply researched, this page-turner about criminal rare book dealer Johnny Jenkins is by none other than Michael Vinson, a leading rare book dealer himself, and so a biographer with an insider’s knowledge of the business. Rare books and documents are the DNA of the stories we tell about our history; burning them or presenting forgeries is to mess with something sacred. This is not a simple story, and the subject was an extremely unusual person.
Gene Fowler’s Mavericks: A Gallery of Texas Characters (University of Texas Press, 2008). I cannot recall how I first came upon Fowler’s work, but whenever it was, count me a fan. He writes high faultin’ art criticism and is himself a performance artist (e.g., “Astroturf Ranchette”). Now that I think about it, it may have been his wild-ride of a book, Border Radio… Or maybe it was Mystic Healers and Medicine Shows… or Crazy Water? (P.S. Maverick Bobcat Carter just might decide to pop into my book.)
Brad Rockwell’s The Life and Times of Alberto G. Garcia: Physician, Mexican Revolutionary, Texas Journalist, Yogi (Alegría Press, 2020)
I was delighted to give this book a blurb:
“Dr. Alberto G. Garcia was Texas’ pioneer yogi, and so much more… This first biography of this extraordinarily accomplished man opens a new and strange window onto Austin history, Texas history, Mexican-American history, the Mexican Revolution, and the transnational development of esoteric movements and philosophies.”–C.M. Mayo
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What can you find here at ye olde Madam Mayo blog in 2021? As noted above, this year I am dedicating the first Monday of the month to selected treasures in the Texas Bibliothek, that is, my personal working library. As in 2020, the second Monday of the month will be for my writing workshop students and anyone else interested in creative writing; the third Monday for my podcasts and publications, should I happen to have a new one; the fourth Monday Q & A with a fellow writer; and the fifth Monday, when there is one, for my newsletter and cyberflanerie.
A Visit to El Paso’s “The Equestrian”
Q & A: Carolina Castillo Crimm,
Author of De León: A Tejano Family History
In Memorium:
William C. Gruben and his “Animals in the Arts in Texas”