Reviews, Kind Words and Comments

Goodreads

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3630794-the-cottonwood-tree#other_reviews

“The best book about cottonwood trees, including their mythology, is The Cottonwood Tree: [An American Champion] by Kathleen Cain.”

-          Don Lago, Where the Sky Touched the Earth: The Cosmological Landscapes of the Southwest

Kathleen Cain’s The Cottonwood Tree: An American Champion has everything a tree enthusiast could want to know about cottonwoods.”

– Stuart Weir, author and illustrator, in essay “Plains Cottonwood.” © 1998-2014.

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From a reader in Oklahoma:

>Kathleen,
>
>Hello! Wanted to share the excitement for the day with you since YOU are
>the one that made it possible. :) Received a text message earlier today
>with someone asking how to find the COTTONWOOD STAR. While multi-tasking, I
>sent a brief reply. Several hours later I received a text photo, which is
>attached/forwarded here. Hope you can catch a little glimpse of the JOY
>that your wonderful book is creating. Again, thank you.
>
>Happy Autumn!
>Debra
>
>

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Kathleen Cain, a longtime member of the Colorado library and academic 

community (retired from Front Range Community College), has just 

published The Cottonwood Tree: An American Champion (Johnson Books). 

I was so taken by the book I asked her permission to post a note to 

this list. In addition to being a densely researched natural history 

of the cottonwood tree, it is also a Western romance of our part of 

the world a la James Michener, weaving history, science, art and  

myth with dry good humor. It would be an intelligent book club pick; 

Kathleen is also available for talks.

Kathleen is an award-winning poet, and her engaging prose shows her 

skill with words.

Congratulations, Kathleen!

Your longtime fan,

Pat

Pat Wagner, Management Consultant at Pattern Research, Inc., Denver, Colorado, posting to Libnet (library listserv)

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“Have you ever seen the cottonwood star?” my father asked, as we were out walking one day.

The question caught me by surprise. “No,” I told him. I hadn’t.

“Here.” He stopped and picked up a twig from the ground . . . “You have to cut cleanly,” he instructed. “No hacking. Not jagged. One cut is best.”  . . . “There, now. Look.” He turned the twig so I could gaze directly into its center. Running crosswise through the middle of the small piece of wood, the cut revealed a reddish-brown and nearly perfect five-pointed star.

            And so poet and naturalist Kathleen Cain fell in love with the cottonwood tree. Regarded by many as a nuisance, a “trash tree,” the cottonwood not only has a fascinating history, it has served noble purposes as well. Ranging from Vermont to Arizona to Alaska, this native North American tree, in various sizes, shapes, and subspecies, has been a sacred symbol, a shelter providing relief from both heat and cold, a signpost for the lost and weary—and underneath its branches many dreams have been born.

            In a magical blend of art and science, the author looks not only at the cottonwood—how it grows, how it travels, and what it says—but at the roles it has played and continues to play in the art, health, and history of North America. If you need the science, you will find it here—if you need the human heart, you will find it here as well.

            “Champion” means winner, defender, something outstanding—a hero. After reading The Cottonwood Tree: An American Champion you will see why this remarkable tree stands so tall in the American landscape.

            David M. Perkins, author of the forthcoming “I May or May Not Love You: Poems.”

Awards

2018

Folded Word Press monthly WordFold winner for November; “Lack of Light” (haibun)

Women on Writing Honorable Mention for creative nonfiction (Q3), “Flight Path.”

2017

The Cottonwood Tree: An American Champion (Big Earth Publishing. Boulder, CO. 2007) selected as part of the Nebraska 150 Book Project, in honor of 150 years of statehood.

Nebraska Poetry: A Sesquicentennial Anthology, 1967-2017 included two poems: “1936” and “Sunset Clouds Retell History Outside Lincoln, Nebraska.”

Winter 2011-2012

Honorable mention from The Eleventh Muse for “Winds Near the Red Cliffs, Deer Creek Mesa” (poem)

2007   

The Cottonwood Tree: An American Champion (Big Earth Publishing.

Boulder, CO. 2007) nominated for a Colorado Book Award (nonfiction)

1991

Honorary mention for poem “Talamh Slán” (Safe Space) at the Minnesota

Irish Feis

1983 

Individual artist fellowship in poetry from The Colorado Council on the

Arts.

1982   

Essay “Cather Country” nominated for a Pushcart Prize by the editors,

The Bloomsbury Review

1981   

First prize, Foothills Poets contest. Foothills Art Center, Golden, Colorado.