Norman Maclean: A Life of Letters and Rivers by Rebecca McCarthy

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Folio: The Seattle Athenaeum is delighted to welcome author Rebecca McCarthy, in conversation with author Jonathan Evison, about her book, Norman Maclean: A Life of Letters and Rivers. The book will be available for purchase at the event in partnership with The Elliott Bay Book Company.

A River Runs Through It and Other Stories turned Norman Maclean into a late-in-life literary phenomenon and then a household name after the success of the Hollywood film based on the title story. Yet fewer know of Maclean's lifelong struggles to reconcile very different parts of himself: the revered teacher and writer in the intellectual hub of Chicago and the Montana man compelled by the wildness and traumas of his home state and family, including the tragic Mann Gulch fire and the murder of his brother.  Rebecca McCarthy's intimate portrait of Maclean draws on her long friendship with the author from the time she became a student at the University of Chicago through the rest of his life. Irrepressible as a teacher, Maclean shared guidance, advice, campus and city rambles, and loyal friendship with generations of students. Behind the scenes, he honed an art as meditative and patient as his approach to fly fishing. McCarthy's experiences intertwine with stories from friends, family, colleagues, and others to detail an incredibly rich life that seemed destined to remain divided--until the creation of his classic American story.

Rebecca McCarthy is a writer who spent twenty-one years as an award-winning reporter at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Her work has been published in the New York Times, the American Scholar, Fast Company, and other venues.

Jonathan Evison is the author of the novels All About Lulu, West of Here, The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving, This Is Your Life, Harriet Chance!, Lawn Boy, and Legends of the North Cascades. He lives with his wife and family in Washington State.

Located in the heart of Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood, The Elliott Bay Book Company is a full service bookstore. We offer one of the region's best selection of new books, with over 150,000 titles, as well as a large collection of remainders.