2020 Montana Book Award Honor Book

"(These) stories should be required reading." -Montana BookAward Committee 

Tom "Harp" Harpole was a horse logger working from remotemountain camps and living in wall tents until an accident suggested a change oflifestyle. He took to his other avocation - writing, and studied abroad inIreland. He began publishing stories in periodicals such as Smithsonian Air& Space, Sports Illustrated, Crocodil, Montana Quarterly, Whitefish Review,and more. In 1986 his story "The Last of Butch" (Faber & Faber, London) wasselected as The Best Short Story in the British Isles. His work has beenshort-listed for the National Magazine Award twice, and translated into sixlanguages. He has been a guest reader on NPR more than a dozen times. Harpolewrites in a voice that uses his natural wit and humor to shed light on alife of stories that bring readers to the edge of danger. "Tom Harpole is whatyou might call a thinking man's Evel Knievel," - Aaron Parrett, author of Montana: Then & Now

Certain magazines that assigned Harp feature articles knew earlyon that he would try anything that involved physical/emotional risks. Heregarded himself as a Survivor'sEuphoria aficionado. Hiswillingness and perspective on dalliances with danger range from an N.F.L.record, to horse logging, to skydiving with Russian cosmonauts, to getting ablack bear stoned, to his compassion as a volunteer EMT in rural Montana, toprotesting Gorbachev in 1990, to driving ice roads above the Arctic circle, andmore. This book is a collection of sixteen of his most popular stories.