Local Authors

Something about the Red Lodge area attracts creative people. We have quite a collection of poets, sculptors, painters, and (of course) writers. We define "local" author a wee bit loosely, since in this part of the country someone can live a mile away and we'll still call him "neighbor." To us, if you can drive to Red Lodge in an hour or so, we're pleased to call you local.

Dan Aadland, Ph.D., is a lifelong horseman, rancher, and writer. Author of seven books and many magazine articles (he’s currently a columnist for Equus and The Trail Rider) Dan taught English on high school and college levels while developing, with his wife Emily, a Tennessee Walking Horse breeding and training facility on the ranch that’s been in Emily’s family for 110 years. A proponent of the multi-skilled backcountry horse, Dan has also been a work horse teamster since logging in the 1980’s with Big Jim, his Belgian stallion.

Lynn Boughey is an attorney who splits his time between his home here in Red Lodge and another in Minot, North Dakota. His book, Mission to Chara, is a spy thriller set mostly in Russia.

Jim Branger has written two science fiction stories, one of which (Forbidden Wasteland) was endorsed by Anne McCaffrey.

John Clayton is an independent journalist, essayist, and corporate ghostwriter based in Red Lodge. John's major book, The Cowboy Girl, is a biography of the Montana/Wyoming novelist, journalist, and homesteader Caroline Lockhart. It relies on archival materials not available to Lockhart's previous biographers. John has taught at Rocky Mountain College and is on the advisory board for the Montana Center for the Book. One of his favorite annual events is the Montana Festival of the Book in Missoula.

Formerly an interpretive naturalist for the U.S. Forest Service, Gary Ferguson is the author of 16 books on nature, science and history. His recent work, Hawks Rest (National Geographic), became the first book in history to win nonfiction Book of The Year from both the Pacific Northwest and Mountains and Plains booksellers associations. He was the 2002 Seigel Scholar at the School of Political Science at Washington University, St. Louis; in January 2007, he had a five-month tenure as Distinguished Visiting Writer at the University of Montana. Gary's nature and science-based essays can be heard on National Public Radio affiliates throughout the country.

Tom Flaherty, a 30-year sportswriter, shows his wry sense of humor in Jocks & Socks, a collection of baseball stories from a clubhouse insider that you'll never find on the sports page. A clubhouse is a safe haven where ballplayers can be themselves without worrying about the scrutiny of fans or the intrusion of reporters. From 1966 to 1997, Flaherty's coauthor Jim Ksicinski was the keeper of such a sanctuary at Milwaukee's County Stadium, where he served as headwaiter, valet, and confidant for hundreds of major-league players and coaches.

Billings author T L Hines writes "Noir Bizarre" stories, mixing mysteries with oddities in books such as Waking Lazarus (which is set here in Red Lodge), The Dead Whisper On, and The Unseen. His work has won recognitions ranging from the Maryland Writers Association novel contest to Library Journal's "25 Best Genre Fiction Books of the Year" award. His long list of past odd jobs includes trimming Christmas trees, sorting seed potatoes, selling strawberries, and cleaning cadaver storage rooms. As a teen, he was undefeated in air guitar competitions (a record of 3-0), in which he performed songs by ZZ Top.

Raised in both upstate New York and Montana, Red Lodge author Sarie Mackay graduated summa cum laude from the State University of New York at Fredonia with a degree in English Literature and a Specialization in Professional Writing. Her recently completed manuscript, a western romance entitled Fair Game, sketched in Montana’s legendary Judith Basin, is a tale of personal and moral dilemma from which redemption evolves. The alpha male wolf in Fair Game was inspired by Wolf No. 2, one of the earliest members of the Yellowstone Park wolf reintroduction project.

Gary Robson, who owns Red Lodge Books with his wife, Kathy, started out writing about technology and moved to nature/science books for children. He's best known for his Who Pooped in the Park? series, which now consists of 17 books set in national parks and ecosystems all around the country. The first (and still most popular) of the series was the Yellowstone edition, which has now sold about 50,000 copies. Gary's Closed Captioning Handbook (Focal Press) was written primarily for people in the broadcasting business, and is now used as a college textbook.

Russell Rowland is the author of two acclaimed novels, In Open Spaces (Harpercollins) and The Watershed Years (Riverbend). In Open Spaces made the San Francisco Chronicle's bestseller list and received a starred review from Publisher's Weekly. The New York Times called it a novel with a 'muted elegance.' The Watershed Years was a finalist for the High Plains Book Award. Russell is a graduate of the Creative Writing Program at Boston University and a former Writer in Residence at St. Mary's College. Russell currently teaches online writing workshops and does private consulting.

We are looking forward to Mark Spragg's new book, Bone Fire, with great anticipation! The release date is March 09, 2010, and we will be having a release event (with a reading and book signing) here at the store shortly thereafter. Watch our calendar here for the final schedule when we have it nailed down. (We've read a pre-release copy of Bone Fire, and we loved it) Mark's first novel, Fruit of Stone, is out of print at the moment, but it will be re-released when Bone Fire comes out in paperback in 2011.

Since 1991, Red Lodge author Robert Stone has been writer, photographer, and publisher of Day Hike Books. Robert has hiked every trail in the Day Hike Book series. With twenty-three hiking guides in the series, many in their third and fourth editions, he has hiked thousands of miles of trails throughout the western United States and Hawaii. Robert is a Los Angeles Times Best Selling Author.

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