Livingston’s Elk River Books is excited to celebrate the 12th annual Independent Bookstore Day on Saturday, April 26, with in-store specials, refreshments and book signings by poet Tami Haaland and children’s author Megan Hollingsworth. The celebration lasts all day from 11 am to 5 pm, with the book signings happening from 2 to 5 pm.
Tami Haaland’s new collection of poems, her fourth, is If I Had Said Beauty. It explores the possible narratives and distant origins of what lies behind a sense of self—including recent and ancient DNA, recessive and dominant traits, mitochondrial underpinnings, and an intricate microbiome. Luminous and spare, the poems seek to unravel and speculate, document and lament what happens in a life and what might have been.
Haaland is a former Montana poet laureate and a recipient of an Artist Innovation Award from Montana Arts Council as well as a Montana Governor’s Humanities Award.
Megan Hollingsworth is the author of Frog Song, illustrated by Bonnie Gordon-Lucas. Recommended for readers ages 9 and up, Frog Song leads with an interspecies love poem inspired by “Toughie,” the last known living Rabbs’ fringe-limbed treefrog. With Toughie’s true story, resources for further learning, conservation homework suggestions and a section on big picture continuation, Frog Song supports imagination put to practical action for everyone’s benefit.
Hollingsworth earned her master’s degree in environmental studies from the University of Montana and is currently an East West Psychology doctoral student at California Institute of Integral Studies.
Independent Bookstore Day (Indie Bookstore Day) was established in 2013 to promote, celebrate, and highlight the value of the independent bookstore community. The day has been observed on the last Saturday of April every year since 2013. This year there are over 1,200 stores participating across the country.
