Reading and Conversation: Family Matters

READING AND CONVERSATION: FAMILY MATTERS

featuring Susan Pope and Kate Troll

Thursday, September 26, 2024 | 6:30-7:45PM
via Zoom

This event is free and open to the public. Registration is required. 

Family is one of the most complicated subjects an writer can grapple with. Whether we love them, hate them, or something in between, the presence (or absence) of our families leaves an undeniable mark on our lives and our stories. But writing about them can be difficult, and can lead to some tough questions: how do we couch our own stories in the context of our family history? What’s okay to share, and what isn’t? How do we preserve the privacy of our loved ones? How do we represent our family members as complex, deeply human characters, while also remaining true to our own experiences?

In this first installment of our new themed Reading & Conversation series, we’ll hear from two Alaskan authors, Susan Pope and Kate Troll, who know what it is to grapple with the question of family in their writing. Each author will give a brief reading of her work, followed by an interactive Q&A session with the audience.

About the Author: Susan Pope

Susan Pope’s life has been shaped by growing up in the wild terrain of Alaska. Mountains, rivers, glaciers, oceans. These form the settings for her stories about family, nature, and the rapidly changing landscape of her homeland. In her memoir, she follows the threads that bind five generations of her family to Alaska.  

Yet, she also succumbs to the lure of faraway places—Africa, Bhutan, South America, the desert Southwest. With humor, humility, and courage she confronts the challenges and disappointments of motherhood and grandmother-hood, her fear of heights and drowning, the secrets of a found diary, a crumbling family legacy, and more. 

Susan earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and communication from the University of Washington, a master’s degree in counseling psychology from the University of Alaska Anchorage, and a Ph.D. in human and organization development from the Fielding Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara. She has worked as a family counselor, educator, organizational consultant, curriculum developer, child welfare researcher, and freelance writer. She finds joy in books, writing, exploring wild places near and far from home, and spending time with family and friends. She lives with her husband in Anchorage, Alaska. 

Her work has appeared in Pilgrimage, Under the Sun, The Southeast Review Online, Cirque: A Literary Journal of the Pacific Rim, Hippocampus, Under the Gum Tree, Burrow Press Review, BioStories, Writers’ Workshop Review, Alaska Magazine, Deep Wild, HerStry, Canary, and Burningword Literary Review, among others.

About Rivers & Ice: One Woman’s Journey Toward Family and Forgiveness: A rafting disaster, a failed canoe journey, a dash to reach a summit while deserting her daughter in bear country. In her memoir, Susan Pope struggles to reconcile the competing forces in her life: the lure of travel with the safety of home; the love of family with the desire for independence; and the image of who she aspires to be with the reality of her faltering attempts at marriage, career, motherhood, grandmother-hood, and physical competence. She follows five generations of one Alaskan family evolving with the rapidly changing landscape of the North. Few memoirs combine love of nature with love of family so eloquently, while at the same time acknowledging that each carries the potential for so much loss and pain.

“With unflinching honesty, Susan Pope explores the complexities of a uniquely Alaskan life’s journey that will resonate with readers no matter where they live…A memorable exploration of resilience and hope that gives readers much to ponder.” — Deb Vanasse, author of Roar of the Sea and Wealth Woman, co-founder of 49 Writer’s, Alaska.

About the Author: Kate Troll

Kate Troll is an author, op-ed columnist, wilderness adventurer, and speaker on conservation and climate issues.  Her opinion pieces have been published in the Washington Post, the L.A. Times and the Nation. For three years she was a regular columnist for Alaska’s only statewide paper. In 2017, Kate published a creative nonfiction book that combined wilderness adventure stories with lessons and insights about sustainability and climate change. Her book, The Great Unconformity, Reflections on Hope in an Imperiled World, led to her being invited as faculty at the Chuckanut Writer’s Conference in Bellingham, Washington.

About All in Due Time: “Kate Troll’s frank personal memoir proves that Tolstoy was wrong — All happy families are not alike. The six talented, close-knit Troll siblings shared a loving, fun-filled childhood and remain best of pals as adults. Turns out, there is something (or I should say someone?) missing. And that is only half of it. All in Due Time is full of surprises and puzzles, but mostly it made me wish I were a long-lost Troll.” — Heather Lende, Alaska State Writer Laureate and author of If You Lived Here, I’d Know Your Name

The surprises and turns in the story provide an opportunity for the author to fill in important backstories and topics relevant to today’s women and families. For example, the backstory of the author’s mother includes her being sent off to live in a home for “ostracized women and unwed mothers.” In this way All in Due Time provides a unique glimpse into how far women have come in the last seventy years. Additionally the author explores timely topics such as the influence of birth order and how much of our political ideology comes from our genetics. It is these backstories and investigations that makes All in Due Time a robust and fascinating read relevant for our times.

This event is free and open to the public. Attendees will receive a Zoom link on registering.

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