September at the Narrow Gauge
- Jean Alger
- 7 hours ago
- 10 min read
The golden-rod is yellow;
The corn is turning brown;
The trees in apple orchards
With fruit are bending down.
The gentian's bluest fringes
Are curling in the sun;
In dusty pods the milkweed
Its hidden silk has spun.
The sedges flaunt their harvest,
In every meadow nook;
And asters by the brook-side
Make asters in the brook.
From dewy lanes at morning
the grapes' sweet odors rise;
At noon the roads all flutter
With yellow butterflies.
By all these lovely tokens
September days are here,
With summer's best of weather,
And autumn's best of cheer.
But none of all this beauty
Which floods the earth and air
Is unto me the secret
Which makes September fair.
'T is a thing which I remember;
To name it thrills me yet:
One day of one September
I never can forget.
- "September" by Helen Hunt Jackson.
It's hard to believe that summer is almost past, that the fall equinox is nearly upon us. It's starting to become cliché, to say I don't know where the time went, but I truly don't.
We've been busy at the bookstore, celebrating our 7th Anniversary. One of my earliest experiences with community and the San Luis Valley happened when the Narrow Gauge Newsstand closed, and the community rallied to open the Book Cooperative. It was wonderful to see, and I'm still a little in awe that now I'm a key part of the NGBC's operations.
We kicked off the month with an incredibly fun Midsummer Murder Mystery. We're so grateful to Visit Alamosa for letting us takeover First Friday and supporting us as we played an epic Clue-style murder mystery game. We're still getting feedback about how fun the event was, and we agree! We had so much fun running it! We're grateful to Beth Sumner and her team at Visit Alamosa, and also to our friends who played parts in our theatrics: Lares Feliciano, Bothe and Zed Kretsinger, Macey Sigaty, and Angela Haynie. We're also grateful to the locations that let us use their space for the game: Mammoth Fudge, The Sanctuary, SLV's TEA Spot, No Limit Arcade, and Hobby Town. We couldn't do these events without enthusiasm and support from the community!
After First Friday, we kept up the fun with a reading and discussion with Michael Espinoza, an artist reception with Joni Franks, Spadefoot Story Slam, and then we participated in SLV Pride Fest on the 22nd and 23rd. We're proud sponsors of Pride, and we were excited to hold a Reading Party in the park as a pre-kickoff event for the second year in a row. Louisa made a bunch of delicious vegan, gluten free snacks and we ordered cookies from Snakes and Cakes bakery. It was a fun night of books and conversation, even though the wind and rain tried to shoo us inside. Delilah and I vended at PrideFest itself and it was lovely to be there while people browsed and purchased books and celebrated love, identity, and community.
We have one more event for August, before we move into a slower September, and we are ready for a little bit of a breath. We love hosting events for our community, but sometimes our excitement surpasses our energy levels. We're ready for some slow, cozy days as we move into the fall season.
Though I had daydreamed about owning a bookstore, when I moved here in 2017 actually working at an independent bookstore wasn't part of my plan. This reflects most of my life: make a plan, map out the journey, and find myself taking a different route. I'm curious to see where this path I'm on takes me, and I'm glad it brought me to this community.
Non-Profit of the Month: KRZA
Each month, we feature a local nonprofit that serves the San Luis Valley. For September, you can support KRZA!
From their mission statement:"KRZA is dedicated to maintaining its role as a connecting force in the community. We honor and preserve our Hispanic heritage and recognize the changing demographics that form the listenership of today. We serve our audience through quality programming that; entertains, provides information, and furthers the discussion of peace, social justice, the environment and intercultural sharing. Connecting cultures along the Upper Rio Grande." KRZA is one of our supporters, and we're grateful to them for promoting our events and our store on the radio. Local, community radio is incredibly important, and we appreciate all the work they do to host local musicians and other artists, and to share culture and heritage throughout the San Luis Valley.
Find out more about KRZA and their programming at their website, and you can also find them on Facebook at KRZA Radio and Instagram @krza_887.
Check out their book recommends, and be sure to round up when you shop at the Narrow Gauge in September!
Bless Me Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya
Ishmael by Daniel Quinn
Zoot Suit by Luis Valdez
September Artist: Trina Council
Trina Council has lived in the San Luis Valley for nearly ten years. As a child she moved around from California to Colorado to Texas, where she spent most of her adolescence and young adulthood. As an adult, she spent time in Dallas, Fort Worth, New Orleans, Chicago, and Taos, before finally landing here in the SLV in 2016, where she and her family immediately felt at home.
Trina took art classes while attending University of North Texas but did not continue her pursuit of art until five years ago during the Great Pandemic Lockdown.
Prior to watercolor art, she created collage journals, taught herself coptic stitching, sewed her daughter's clothes in elementary school, created quilted cards, sewed quilted bags and totes, and a number of other creative pursuits.
Trina’s first art show was at the Narrow Gauge BOok Cooperative in 2020, thanks to then-manager Amaranth’s faith in her. When she first began to make art, it was a way to keep sane during the 2020 pandemic lockdown. She had been sewing for a few years, and, along with sewing face masks for others, began watercolor painting long into the night.
Once worried that her pieces didn’t have a “deep” meaning for “real” connoisseurs of art to understand, Trina now realizes that painting what makes her happy and brings others joy is the deeper meaning in a world increasingly filled with uncertainty, fear, and anguish. Her heart fills with joy if someone smiles at the sight of her heart, and she’s happy if they purchase her art because they carry a piece of her art with them.
We’re so pleased to have Trina as a featured artist this month, and hope you’ll enjoy her work as much as we do!
Join us on September 6th from 4pm - 6pm for a come-and-go reception. You’ll have a chance to chat with Trina about her art, which will be on display all month.
The Summer Reading Express is coming to a close - if you missed it in the last newsletters, head on over to our website at this link and learn all about it! You still have time to check off some categories, and you may have even read something this summer that fits!
So far, I (Jean) have checked off nine categories so far, 3 more since the last newsletter. I finished The Age of Goodbyes, a strange and brilliantly structured narrative that I recommend whole-heartedly, and I read The Summer Before the Dark by Doris Lessing. This one, I really didn't enjoy, mostly because of the narrative point of view: limited third person with little dialogue, just inner thoughts, became oppressive-- maybe that was the point. I'm hoping to finish a couple more before Sunday's gathering, but we'll see!
What are your favorite reads of the summer? What categories should we try for next year's Summer Reading Express?
September Events at the Narrow Gauge
For September's First Friday, the Alamosa Live Music Association is holding a mini music festival, and we're excited to be part of it!
At 6:10pm on Friday, September 5th, we'll have WhaDubber in store to with his electronic music setup. Join us for some electro-funk, live-looping, and beats that are going to make you want to move!
We're the second stop of the night for Roaming Rhythms and we're excited to see you!
On Saturday September 13th, come downtown for the Alamosa Art Fest from 1pm to 6pm! The bookstore will be open, so be sure to stop in and see us! We might even have a little inspiration for you to pick up to help you enjoy the artscape walk even more!
September 15th - October 15th is Hispanic Heritage Month. Be sure to check the display tables for books that celebrate Hispanic, Latine, and Chicanx writers!
Spadefoot Story Slam: September 20th, 6pm
Each month, we host the Spadefoot Story Slam community, sharing stories based on a theme, selected at the previous month’s Slam. While inspired by the Moth Story Hour, our monthly meetings are not a contest, but instead are a way to come together and practice sharing, and deep listening.
This September, join us for your stories on LESSONS. Prepare a story about a time you got schooled. From your alma mater to your own mother. Flashes of enlightenment. Trial-and-error, trial-by-fire, and aha! moments. Lead a horse to water and teach it to fish. Tell us about a time you had to learn the hard way. A time you failed the test. A time when experience was the best teacher.
Stories should be true as remembered by you, and spoken from the heart, instead of read from the page. We don’t have an official time limit, but encourage stories that take 10 minutes or less, especially if we have a large group. We look forward to seeing you on September 20th at 6pm!
Call for Artists for 2026
We are all full up for artists for 2025, and are now seeking to fill our 2026 calendar!
Our most common features are painting and photography, though we have also had fiber arts, glass art, and ceramics.
Featured artists have a show for one month. We'll promote your art on our social media accounts, feature you in our monthly newsletter, send a press-release to the newspaper, and schedule an artist reception if you want to have one.
We try to feature new artists each year; if you were featured in 2025, please wait to apply again until we put out a call for 2027.
If you would like to be a featured, please fill out the application by clicking here. You'll be asked to upload photo samples of your work, to provide a bio and artist statement, and to provide months when you are not available. If you have questions about any part of the application, please email us at narrowgauge.coop@gmail.com.
Coming Up This Fall
Indie Press Book Club Feature
The Narrow Gauge Book Cooperative is happy to feature Coffee House Press for our featured independent press for September and October!
From their website: “Coffee House Press began as a small letterpress operation in 1972 and has grown into an internationally renowned nonprofit publisher of literary fiction, essay, poetry, and other work that doesn’t fit neatly into genre categories.
Following the small press movement of the 60s and 70s, the 80s saw an emergence of professionalization among small publishers. Coffee House Press's late founder Allan Kornblum saw an opportunity to create the sort of publishing house that he wished existed in the world.
Since Coffee House Press's founding, our authors have received and been finalists for numerous nominations and prizes, including the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction, the Kingsley Tufts Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Award, and the Pulitzer Prize.
With your support, we’re able to make experimental, creative choices rather than react solely to sales algorithms and trends.
Coffee House Press creates new spaces for audiences and artists to interact, inspiring readers and enriching communities by expanding the definition of what literature is, what it can do, and to whom it belongs.”
Our book club pick: We’re Safe When We’re Alone by Nghiem Tran
Join us on November 5th to discuss this novella, which has been called “A haunting and mesmerizing debut. Part parable, part fairy tale, and part nightmare, it all seems distilled out of the deepest longing. Nghiem Tran is a powerful new voice.” —Dana Spiotta
It was an NPR best book of 2023, a Kansas Notable Book of 2024, and a USA Today bestseller.
Synopsis: Son has lived his entire life inside the mansion. He is a good child. He reads, practices piano, studies, and watches ghosts tend the farmland through a window in the attic. When Father decides it is time for Son to venture outside, Son’s desire to please Father overpowers his fear, and he must contend with questions he never wanted to face. What are the relentlessly grinning ghosts hiding? Has a ghost taken control of Father? What answers or horrors lie in the forest? And who will stop the mysterious encroaching shadows? Nghiem Tran’s debut inverts the haunted house tale, shaping it into a moving exploration of loss, coming of age in a collapsing world, and the battle between isolation and assimilation.
Many Ways to Shop the NGBC
Shop In Store
You can shop with us in store and browse the shelves. Find the book you're looking for, or find a book you didn't know you were looking for! Our booksellers are happy to help you find the title, make recommendations, or order a book if we don't have it in stock.
Shop Online
We have an indie commerce website, through IndieLite, that allows customers to place orders online. Just go to narrowgaugebooks.com and click on the "Shop Online" button. Then, click "order a book" and you'll be redirected to our indie commerce site. You can search for the book you want, and then place your order from wherever you are! There are options to have your book shipped to you, or to pick up your book in store! You can even have your book shipped to someone else, if you're looking to skip the hassle of shipping the book yourself.
Call Us!
You can call us at 719-589-3464 to see if we have a book on the shelf. We'll be happy to put it aside for you! We can hold books for up to one week, so you can be sure that title is ready and waiting next time to stop in!
Preorders
You can preorder your next greatly anticipated book! Preorders help us know what our customers are excited about, and help us more effectively judge how many copies we should order. Often, we get new releases ahead of their publishing date, so when publishing Tuesday rolls around, we'll have your shiny new book ready and waiting for you to dive into the pages!
Be sure to check out this week's Shelf Awareness newsletter. Don't miss releases by your favorite authors, what's going on with your preferred genre, or find an obscure gem. NGBC can order any title referenced, and we can ship it direct to your house.
Happy Book Hunting!
Thank you for reading, thank you for supporting us, and thank you for being our community! - Jean A.
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