Join us to celebrate Iris Jamahl Dunkle’s new creative nonfiction book The Life of Sanora Babb

Reception 6:00, Reading and Discussion with Iris Jamahl Dunkle 6:30-7:00, Book Signing 7:30

In 1939, when John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath was published, it became an instant bestseller and a prevailing narrative in the nation's collective imagination of the era. But it also stopped the publication of another important novel, silencing a gifted writer who was more intimately connected to the true experiences of Dust Bowl migrants. In Riding Like the Wind, renowned biographer Iris Jamahl Dunkle revives the groundbreaking voice of Sanora Babb.

Dunkle follows Babb from her impoverished childhood in eastern Colorado to California. There, she befriended the era's literati, including Ray Bradbury and Ralph Ellison; entered into an illegal marriage; and was blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee. It was Babb's field notes and oral histories of migrant farmworkers that Steinbeck relied on to write his novel. But this is not merely a saga of literary usurping; on her own merits, Babb's impact was profound. Her life and work feature heavily in Ken Burns's award-winning documentary The Dust Bowl and inspired Kristin Hannah in her bestseller The Four Winds. Riding Like the Wind reminds us with fresh awareness that the stories we know—and who tells them—can change the way we remember history.

"No novelist captured the relentless devastation of the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, or the cruel treatment of the desperate 'Okies' forced to leave their homes on the Plains for California, better than Sanora Babb. In this biography, Iris Jamahl Dunkle explains why. Hardship, hunger and struggle, discrimination and stubborn prejudice, big dreams thwarted by fate and bad luck––these were also recurring elements of Babb's own remarkable personal story. But she met it all with an indomitable will, a vivaciously free spirit, and an unbending devotion to her artistic vision. Riding Like the Wind is a both heartbreaking and heroic tale that brings to vivid life an important American writer who never received the critical acclaim and commercial success she deserved."—Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan, producers of The Dust Bowl

"In my years of researching the lost historical stories of resilient women, few have resonated with me as much as Sanora Babb. A journalist and writer, she was a true trailblazer and a woman who deserves to be remembered for her contributions to both literature and history. This recognition and remembrance of her work is long overdue. I am thrilled that Dunkle has chosen to shine a light on the heartbreaking story of Babb's life and her remarkable novel about the Dust Bowl and the migration of workers to California during the Great Depression. I hope this book encourages readers to also read Whose Names Are Unknown, Babb's account of the period."—Kristin Hannah, author of The Four Winds and The Women