Glen Canyon Betrayed:

A Sensuous Elegy
by Katie Lee
Fretwater Press 2006

Katie Lee, at 87, is not slowing down. Just this month she is publishing the 296-page book Glen Canyon Betrayed, A Sensuous Elegy, and Love Song to Glen Canyon, a half-hour a DVD of her magnificent photographs of Glen Canyon with commentary and song.

In her 40-year career in the entertainment industry, Lee has been an author, musicologist, folk singer, storyteller, Hollywood actress, song writer, filmmaker, photographer, poet, and river runner. She has been active in environmental causes ever since the destruction of her beloved Glen Canyon.
Her first book, Ten Thousand Goddam Cattle, tells the story of the American cowboy in song, story, and verse. Sandstone Seduction, her book of essays, was released to acclaim in 2004. But her most impressive work, the 1998 memoir, All My Rivers Are Gone: A Journey of Discovery Through Glen Canyon, had quietly slipped out of print.

My trips through Glen Canyon and the river that ran through it gave me an understanding of myself, my talent and its limitations; taught me about intimacy and the value of observation. Together they resurrected my spirit and melted my heart with their beauty; showed me time was not my enemy, and, with their power to entertain, mystify, and nearly kill me, diluted my ego to its proper consistency. The Glen gave me roots as tenacious as the willows along its banks.

Now with Lake Powell levels at an historic low and side canyons re-excavating themselves with each new season of drought, Katie Lee feels the need to restate her case. All My Rivers has been re-edited, redesigned, re-titled, and complimented with new photographs and an index. As well, Glen Canyon Betrayed contains a fiery new afterword by Ms. Lee herself, looking back on Glen Canyon forty years after its drowning and voicing how we might treat it as it reappears.

What really needs changing is us--not the canyons, not the legal status or accessibility, but us. With so many people in Mother Earth's face, knocking on her door, getting into her drawers, our children will miss the opportunity to wonder and be amazed at the magic in canyons and far flung desert trails; of a black night sky dense with stars; of mountain vistas uncluttered by humans. The more we insist upon multiplying, the fewer our sanctuaries become.
Glen Canyon was one of those sanctuaries. I was there. I know. It should become one again.

To compliment the release of her book and DVD, Ms. Lee will present a series of appearances around the Southwest, speaking, reading, singing, showing her images, and signing books. To purchase Katie Lee's music and DVDs, or arrange an event in your area, contact Katydid Books & Music, Box 395, Jerome, AZ 86331; (928) 634-8075.

Glen Canyon Betrayed is available from Fretwater Press.

If you get a chance, catch her in person. Katie Lee is a true force of nature.
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Katie Lee is a joyful raconteur, a woman with grit, grace and humor. She is not afraid to laugh and tease, cajole and flirt, cuss, rant, howl, sing and cry. Katie Lee is the desert's lover. Her voice is a torch in the wilderness.
-- Terry Tempest Williams