Join co-hosts Alba West & Bri Castellini as they chat with other writers (and each other!) about their creative processes, good books, and literary gripes.
Episodes produced prior to April 2025 sponsored in part by The Grand Junction Commission on Arts & Culture.
In 2025, the podcast migrated to Spotify, and we now cross-post to our YouTube channel for closed-captioning capability.
For December, we’re bringing you a radio show! Lit Radio, a KAFM radio show co-hosted by Western Slope Poet Laureate Wendy Videlock and WCWF President Melody Jones, decided to invite High Desert Voices co-host Christie Matherne to the radio station to talk about all the forms of writing she does for a living. She also reads a vignette she wrote about a Mardi Gras experience in New Orleans.
[Listen with closed captioning on our YouTube channel.] We love gabbing about books so much that we thought we’d invite some other folks to the room for our Whatcha Readin’ sessions, and who is better suited to gab about books than Western Colorado Writers’ Forum board members? So, here’s a treat: a special “Whatcha Readin’?” episode featuring WCWF board members, Jim Van Pelt and John Saluke. They join Christie and Alba in the 970West Recording Studio to talk books—specifically, the literature they’ve been chewing on lately—along with a few literary gripes to close out.
If you enjoyed this one, let us know – we’ll definitely be doing it again.
[Listen with closed captioning on our YouTube channel.] Christie and Alba talk about Ute history, research tools, and the personal perils of a journalism career with author and retired Daily Sentinel editorial page editor, Bob Silbernagel. Bob is the author of five books, all on historic topics, and was named Newsperson of the Year in 2013 by the Colorado Press Association. He currently writes a regular history column for The Daily Sentinel called “First Draft.”
Learn more about Bob, read his columns, and find info on his books at BobSilbernagel.com.
[Listen with closed captioning on our YouTube channel.] Christie and Alba invite Western Colorado Writers’ Forum president, Melody Jones, over to the 970West recording studio to read some of her poetry. The co-hosts pry a bit into the emotional source of her poems afterwards!
Melody reads two poems in this episode:
You can find more about Melody Jones at her website.
[Listen with closed captioning on our YouTube channel.] On this episode of High Desert Voices, Christie and Alba had the pleasure of talking to Dr. Terry Chase, an author, speaker, coach, and teacher with a story to tell and a message to spread. In 2021, Dr. Chase published her book, Spoke By Spoke: How a Broken Back and a Broken Bike Led to a WholeHearted Life, which is a series of stories about how her life – and her approach to it – changed after a severe bicycle accident.
Now, she has built her life around helping people get past big obstacles of all kinds in their lives. Christie and Alba talk to Dr. Chase about her writing process, the stories we tell ourselves to get through life, connecting with her readers through her new Spoke by Spoke Guidebook (and her pop-up coaching sessions with it), and what’s next for her as an author.
Learn more about Dr. Terry Chase on her website, www.DrTerryChase.com, and you can follow her on Facebook and LinkedIn.
Whatcha Readin’ is a segment of High Desert Voices with Christie and Alba. Join these two certified yappers as they chat about books they’ve read recently!
Surprise: We’ve changed the name of this podcast! We’re now “High Desert Voices: A Western Colorado Writers’ Forum Production.” Rolls off the tongue a little better eh?
[Listen with closed captioning on our YouTube channel.]
Christie and Alba welcome author PK Stuart (Pam) to the 970West Studio to talk about her “Time’s End” series of romantic paranormal fantasy books.
We have a candid conversation about her writing routines and methods (including her approach to the “spicy” scenes), choosing aliases, interviewing her characters, and her approach to indie publishing. We also learn about her path to writing—PK Stuart started writing less than 10 years ago, and now has a multi-book series of novels published. You can learn more about PK Stuart and her writing on her website, PKStuart.com.
Pam gave us a list of excellent upcoming writing events to share with our audience:
[Listen with closed captioning on our YouTube channel.]
WCWF board member Jim Van Pelt talks to new podcast host Alba West about the Forum’s new Western Colorado Voices anthology, what writers can learn by reading “slush,” and much more. Submissions for the anthology are due Saturday, January 31!
John and Christie have a chat with Palisadian – and new Western Slope Poet Laureate – Wendy Videlock to talk about her new role, which is to spread poetry far and wide.
Wendy also discusses her artistic journey as both a poet and a visual artist, her tendency to write in rhyme and meter (and how she gets through to publications that avoid them), and her recent book of essays and poetry, The Poetic Imaginarium: A Worthy Difficulty. Nobody on this podcast likes small-talk, so John dives deep with Wendy on topics such as: Can bad people make good art? Is there a difference between poetry by men and poetry by women? And, is all poetry actually about death? This is a long one, but we only kept the good parts.
As the new Western Slope Poet Laureate, Wendy has a bevy of new events and happenings:
Earlier this year, Colorado author, poet, journalist, and Crestone Poetry Festival founder Peter Anderson completed a book ten years in the making. Reading Colorado: A Literary Road Guide takes readers on major and minor highways throughout Colorado, making place-centric literary pit-stops along the way.
In this episode, John and Christie talk to Peter about “deepening the map” of Colorado, how a literary map even comes together despite the magnitude of such a project, his career-long fascination with how landscapes affect people, and what you can expect at the upcoming Crestone Poetry Festival (which starts on Thursday, October 12). Other topics include Peter’s brief stint living in the ghost town of St. Elmo, and a deep dive into why so many types of people – from spiritualists to cowboys – end up in Crestone. If you love the concept of “place” in writing, you don’t want to skip this one.
You can find more about Peter Anderson on his website.
On September 9th, 2023, the fifth iteration of Slamming Bricks – the largest queer-focused invitational poetry slam competition in the Four Corners region – took place at the Avalon Theater in Grand Junction, Colorado.
In this episode, Caleb Ferganchick, the founder and organizer of Slamming Bricks, looks back at 5 years of hard work to tell the colorful story of how the event came to exist, how intersectionality played a key role in helping it grow (from 100 attendees to over 500), and how being “absolutely delusional” is sometimes necessary when you’re chasing a big dream. Featuring slam poetry performances by Pepper Ruzin, Briana Hammerstrom, Adrienne Cascarella, and Caleb Ferganchick.
The third edition of Slamming Bricks: An Anthology is available for purchase online.
Note: This episode contains recordings of poetry performances that use curse words in the context of artistic expression. These remain uncensored.
Christie talks to award-winning poet and social media expert, Melody Jones, about all things social media as it pertains to writers.
Melody’s knowledge spans the basics for beginners, as well as the deeper questions about the use of social media, how to measure success with it, and what on earth to do with it now that we are stuck with it. She also discusses picking which platform to use based on your audience and how e-newsletters can help you keep in touch with your readers.
Melody Jones is an award-winning poet, social media manager, writing and creativity coach, and the President of the Western Colorado Writers’ Forum. Learn more about her on her website, MelodyJonesAuthor.com.
John and Christie interview Rick Kempa about the new issue of the literary journal, Deep Wild: Writing From the Backcountry.
Rick talks about the ins and outs of running a literary journal, how Deep Wild fills a need in the literary landscape, whether or not Deep Wild could be considered “regional literature,” and the importance of writing communities. John and Rick talk shop about their experiences teaching college students to write, and Rick also reads a selection from his own latest book of poetry, Too Vast for Sleep.
Rick Kempa is a poet, former instructor at Western Wyoming College, and avid backpacker, who founded Deep Wild: Writing From the Backcountry five years ago. The annual literary journal is headquartered in Grand Junction and gets submissions from all over the world. To submit work or subscribe to the journal, visit DeepWildJournal.com or find Deep Wild on Facebook. Learn more about Rick Kempa and find links to his work at RickKempa.com.
Dr. John Lanci and Christie Matherne tackle something every writer likely has to do at some point: Public speaking.
Award-winning Toastmaster Director and co-founder of TEDx Grand Junction, Mary Watson, joins us in the studio to talk about dealing with stage fright, avoiding (and counting!) filler words, President Obama’s public speaking style, the difference between writing for publication and writing a speech, and how anyone – anyone! – can become a great public speaker. Listen to the episode for a ton of great opportunities to practice public speaking, including local Toastmaster meetings, open mic standup comedy, and open mic storytelling events.
For more information about the Grand Junction Toastmasters Club, visit their website.
For the first episode of season two, Christie Matherne and Dr. John Lanci talk to Jacob Richards – a local activist, the President of the Mesa County Historical Society, and an avid history writer – about his latest project, People’s History of the Grand Valley.
Jacob also discusses the ins and outs of activism and working with groups of people, the advent of ChatGPT and how writers can utilize it, getting back to nature to avoid burnout, and moments in his life that shaped his path. Listen through the end of the episode to hear some surprising history facts about Grand Junction and western Colorado.
See his work-in-progress history book at PeoplesHistoryOfTheGrandValley.com.
For the holiday season, Avery and Christie offer the gift of more James Van Pelt.
This is the rest of our chat with the award-winning Grand Valley science fiction author. In this half of the interview, James – Jim to his friends – shares his thoughts on the two types of books-about-writing, his early days of writing poetry to get girls, how to accept literary rejection, and that tingly feeling you get when your story is being workshopped. We also talk about the changing self-publishing industry, why it’s not okay to kill the dog (or grandma) in a story, and how science fiction itself has changed since he was young. Follow James Van Pelt on Facebook, or visit his website at JamesVanPelt.com.
In honor of Native American Heritage Month, Avery and Christie chat with Navajo Nation Poet Laureate, Dr. Laura Tohe, about her native language and recent work.
Dr. Tohe shares her journey to poetry, her childhood experience in a Native American boarding school, how she explores culture-wide trauma in her poetry, and details about her interviews with Navajo code talkers for her book, Code Talker Stories. Find more of Dr. Laura Tohe’s work at LauraTohe.com.
In our sixth episode, Grand Junction native and filmmaker Hank Braxtan chats with Avery about the film industry and creating your own definition of success.
With films under his belt such as Snake Outta Compton, Chemical Peel, and Jurassic Hunt, Braxtan is a successful director, producer, and screenwriter. In this episode, he shares his journey through the film industry, starting with humble beginnings at the bottom of the totem pole to his experience living in Los Angeles, his recent return to Grand Junction, and his new goal of establishing a film hub here in Western Colorado. For those interested in screenwriting, Hank shares tips and online resources to help you complete your screenplay, along with some possible opportunities for those wanting to get film industry experience locally.
Follow Hank on Twitter @braxtanfilm.
Aerik Francis and Nico Wilkinson, two Colorado-based award-winning poets who performed at the Slamming Bricks poetry slam competition in Grand Junction this month, chat with Avery about the power of poetry in their lives, what thrills them about Grand Junction’s Pride Week and the Slamming Bricks event, and slam poetry as an art form.
Aerik is a Queer Black and Latinx poet and a teaching artist based in Denver. He is also a Canto Mundo poetry fellow and a The Watering Hole fellow and coordinates events for Slam Nuba in Denver. His latest poetry EP, Syzygy, is available on Bandcamp and his forthcoming chapbook, Miseducation, won New Delta Review’s 2022 chapbook contest in May and will be published in 2023.
Nico Wilkinson is a poet, organizer, and artist based out of Colorado Springs whose book, Inauguration, won the Pikes Peak Arts Council 2017 award for Best Publication. They organize an LGBTQ+ monthly open mic event, Keep Colorado Springs Queer; and founded the Quaill Club, a homestead co-op of queer artists in Colorado Springs. They enjoy writing tender poems about the apocalypse for their Substack, Poems for the Apocalypse, and most recently, poems about chickens.
Emilie Stickley, local comedian and cofounder of Joke Junction, chats with Avery about writing and performing comedy.
She discusses her process for turning life experiences into comedy material, how to craft a funny character in your writing, and the importance of having a goldfish memory. No matter what you may be writing, Emilie covers tips for bringing in your audience, making your work relatable, and building tension to keep them hooked.
Avery and Christie talk poetry with two incredible published Western Colorado poets.
The first half is our chat with award-winning poet and Ouray County’s Poet Laureate, Beth Paulson, who co-founded and co-directed the Open Bard Poetry Series in Ridgway, CO and leads the Ridgway workshop group, Poetica. The second half of the episode features Grand Valley poet and U.S. Army veteran, Lisa Wence Connors, who hosts a monthly Poetry Night at the downtown Grand Junction library, facilitates creative workshops for the VA in Grand Junction, and is a member of the Rock Canyon Poets group. Both poets talk about their creative processes and read their work for us.
Two award-winning LGBTQ+ authors from our Pride episode – Finnian Burnett & Kimberly Cooper Griffin – give us their list of tips and tricks for new writers, especially LGBTQ+ writers.
Also in this episode: Finn & Kim’s thoughts on the recent massive sales uptick in the LGBTQ+ romance novel market, and Avery discusses how even independent booksellers pass over smaller LGBTQ+ publishers in favor of bigger publishing houses.
Avery and Christie interview local LGBTQ+ slam poet, Caleb Ferganchick, to discuss poetry and activism.
Caleb is the founder and organizer of Slamming Bricks: A Riot on 1st Street, the largest LGBTQ+ slam event in the state of Colorado. The second part of the episode features award-winning LGBTQ+ authors Finnian Burnett and Kimberly Cooper Griffin. They talk about flash fiction, novel writing and publishing, and how their Denver-based Inkstacks platform helps writers get from idea to polished manuscript. Finn’s also working on a queer retelling of Shakespeare and Kim’s newest sapphic romance, Sol Cycle, releases today, June 14th! Happy Pride Month everyone!
Avery and Christie interview Grand Valley science fiction author, James Van Pelt.
He discusses his writing process across genres from sci-fi to horror, the odd places he finds inspiration, what he has taught his students about writing during his years teaching English at Fruita Monument High School, and how writing streaks have motivated him to reach some impressive publishing goals. Jim also reads a piece of short fiction called “Everything’s Unlikely.”
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