Part 2 - JOHN NICHOLS, Iconic N.M. Author

Topic: His New Autobiography “I Got Mine” & His Non-Fiction Books

 This week REPORT FROM SANTA FE features Part 2 of an interview with iconic New Mexico author John Nichols, author of such fiction works as "The Milagro Beanfield War" and such non-fiction works as "If Mountains Die."

Watch Part 1 of this interview, and all REPORT FROM SANTA FE episodes, on the PBS Video App.

Also, as part of this new interview, Nichols plays guitar and sings the song, “I Got Mine,” also the title of his autobiography.

The second part of this Nichols' interview focuses on his non-fiction books, among which are his trilogy "If Mountains Die," "The Last Beautiful Days of Autumn," and "On the Mesa." Especially beloved of his works is the non-fiction “My Heart Belongs to Nature: A Memoir in Photographs and Prose.”

Nichols fell in love with nature as a child when his father and grandfather, both naturalists, taught him the names of the flowers and trees, and the herons and butterflies they encountered on walks in rural Long Island, New York.

When Nichols moved to New Mexico as a young man, his passion for the natural world grew. He began photographing the land and critters observable just outside his kitchen window and far beyond. In My Heart Belongs to Nature, Nichols records his forty-five-year connection to the Taos valley and its mountains, where he still lives. He is a long-time political activist for progressive and especially environmental causes.

Nichols is the author of the "New Mexico trilogy," a series about the complex relationship among history, race and ethnicity, and land and water rights in the fictional town of Chamisaville, New Mexico. The trilogy consists of The Milagro Beanfield War (which was adapted into a movie of the same name, directed by Robert Redford), The Magic Journey, and The Nirvana Blues.