“Captivated by the little city that sits on the edge of all that is beautiful in the American Southwest, the authors came together with a mutual respect for a town that has struggled mightily to establish itself in a valley with very little water but a full circle of fabulous views.” Authors Vila Schwindt, Janet Weeth, and Dale Davidson have all been captivated by the Four Corners culture and landscapes and the enduring little city that could. Weeth and Davidson are Southwestern archaeologists, and Schwindt is a writer/editor with a background in graphic design.

This is how so many travelers pass through the desert Southwest: Their instinctual GPS steers them clear of any complex community encounters and heads them straight toward Utah’s Canyonlands, or parks them at the Four Corners Monument to take a photograph with their loved ones standing on the only point in the continental US where four state borders converge, then nudges them on toward that great dip in the road, the Grand Canyon. If you follow this itinerary, you may see the sights but, sadly, you’ll miss the experience. David Feela’s collection of essays, How Delicate These Arches, isn’t a destination guide. It’s like an outfitter’s guarantee to his customers that you paid good money for more than just a tour. David Feela, a recently retired teacher, is a poet, free-lance writer, and writing instructor. His work – poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction – has appeared in hundreds of regional and national publications since 1974, as well as in over a dozen anthologies. Essays have appeared in the Denver Post where he was selected to be a “Colorado Voice” and occasionally been printed as a contributor to the syndicated “Writers on the Range” series produced by the High Country News. For eleven years he served as a contributing editor and columnist for Inside/Outside Southwest and currently writes for the Four Corners Free Press. A poetry chapbook, Thought Experiments (Maverick Press), won the Southwest Poet Series, and his first full length poetry collection appeared in 2009 under the title, The Home Atlas, through WordTech Editions.