Hello, Radio Readers! I’m Jane Holwerda and – believe it or not –it’s time to wrap up this most incredible of Spring Reads, “Water, Water, Neverwhere.” We’ve been reading, thinking and talking about Kelton’s classic novel of drought and farming on the high plains, Bessire’s compelling memoir of water use and accountability in western Kansas, Soutter’s dystopian critique of privatization and commodification, and Carson’s allusively poetic anthropology of water.
These books stimulated a rich array of perspectives towards the uncertain availability of water in the future. Book leaders and readers shared their experiences of living through the 1950s great drought, noted the depleting of aquifers regionally and globally, questioned corporate competition for limited natural resources, and wondered about the impacts on our lives and livelihoods.
We’ve mourned the losses of small businesses and family farms and the corresponding changes to communities throughout the high plains. We’ve criticized market systems that prioritize profit, drive scarcity, deplete resources and our humanity. We’ve shared narratives about the now ubiquitous availability of water bottled in plastic, alternative systems of irrigation, restoration of wastewater, and discussions of characters willing to lose all rather than co-opting, characters eagerly if ignorantly choosing to sell all, to characters whose humanity is as dry and gritty as the deserts surrounding them.
And while book leaders and readers responded with strong feelings and staunch opinions, deepening our awareness of scarcity and the need to sustain resources. Yet so many questions remain: is equitable access to essential, vital resources achievable? What happens to us, to our planet, when we don’t have water and can’t get it? Once depleted of water, how will we replenish? How did we get here? What can be done? What could have been done?
Tough questions, with no easy answers. But we’re not quite ready to stop asking. You, either?
Then please join Radio Readers and BookByters Kath Holt, Hannes Zacharias, Pat Tyree, Jarret Kaufman, Matt Kliewer, and me, on Sunday, May 5, from 1-3pm. You can tune into HPPR-digital or on your dial for what inevitably will be a spirited and robust discussion of the books, ideas, issues and concerns of Radio Readers 2024 Spring Read: Water, Water, Neverwhere.
Though, like meandering streams, torrential rains, and flash floods, our on-air discussions often times flow in unexpected directions to cover new terrains.
That’s Sunday, May 5, from 1-3pm – on HPPR – our live on-air discussion of “Water, Water, Neverwhere.”
For High Plains Public Radio and the Radio Readers Book Club, I’m Jane Holwerda from Dodge City, Kansas.
