Literary Works
This Earth Has Been Too Generous
A collection of environmental poetry. FLP, 2022.
"In this collection, and in so much of her verse and prose, Susan Marsh writes with precision and passion for wild places and their inhabitants. Her poems read as lyrical calls to action to notice, to love, and to protect wildness in the world and in ourselves. These poems create habitats where the reader's imagination can thrive in the restorative power of nature and bear witness to its loss. Reading This Earth Has Been Too Generous reminds us that as we allow wildness in the world to fade, we are ourselves diminished. We need collections like this one."
Matt Daly, author of Between Here and Home (Unsolicited Press, 2019)
War Creek
Winner, May Sarton Award for contemporary fiction, and shortlisted for the Nancy Pearl Award. When ostracized daughter Agnes Clayton, now middle-aged and alone, returns to the wilds of the Northwest after a life in various western cities, she is determined to make moving her father out of their family home in War Creek as quick and painless as possible. Reconnecting with her estranged father, a retired ranger, proves difficult at best, and extracting him from his fiercely beloved ranger station seems impossible. Over the course of a long summer she becomes entangled with opposing forces in the isolated rural community in the Cascade Mountains. Agnes hopes to answer questions from her past and find not only closure but redemption.
A Hunger for High Country
"A Hunger for High Country is a memoir with a mission. On one hand, Susan Marsh shares her romantic notion of the wild places of Montana and Wyoming with descriptive detail. On the other hand, she shows us her strength in her quest to find her place among the male-dominated hierarchy of the National Forest Service (NFS). In this hybrid memoir and scientific report, the author provides insight into the status of federal wilderness lands as our nation transitioned from managing public lands to preserving them. The shift that began in 1964 with the Wilderness Act, signed by Lyndon Baines Johnson, has been a slow one. An inherent conflict pits "amenity" resources like recreation, wilderness and scenic quality against the status quo of utilizing national forests for commodities like timber, minerals and grazing. The old-guard bureaucracy has held on tenaciously for five decades, regardless of new laws enacted.
A baby-boomer, Marsh grew up playing in the woods rather than playing inside with dolls. Even though she had few women role models, she chose a career in environmental conservation. Women in the 1980's were expected to "smile and be pleasant" to have any hope of a career with the National Forest Service. She persisted and wrote, "Yet the longer I stayed the more I loved the forest and it occurred to me that loyalty to a place, a relationship with the land, were more important that moving on to further one's career." If you are a reader who is interested in women who pioneered in fields that are not typically pursued by women, her story is unique.
Marsh's voice is both scientific and poetic as she blends both writing styles in her prose. "Quiet," she warns, "by its nature slips away unnoticed. But once it is gone, we notice." She reflects:
"We've grown to accept, or even expect, a theme park rather than the wild. Without authentic and individual experience, without the practiced intimacy needed to grow a personal relationship with real places, we cannot muster the visceral allegiance to them that is so urgently needed. I worry that the lack of intimate knowledge of the outdoors and its attendant quiet will make us simply forget about both. Silence will go the way of the Dodo, unnoticed and unmourned."
We owe a debt of gratitude to forest workers like Susan Marsh whose tireless efforts have resulted in victories of preserving wild lands that are "outstandingly remarkable."
Martha Meacham, Story Circle Book Reviews
Saving Wyoming’s Hoback: The Grassroots Movement that Stopped Natural Gas Development
Winner of the Wallace Stegner Prize in Environmental Humanities. Co-written with Florence Rose Shepard, author of Sometimes Creek, Ecotone, and other works.
This book tells the story of how a group of local citizens in a remote part of Wyoming was able to start a movement that resulted in a negotiated buy-out of natural gas leases in their home mountains. Lushly illustrated with color photographs, it portrays the Hoback Basin as an important area for wildlife and a way of life for people.
"A fine, personal story of how people who don't always agree with each other found common cause in opposing the industrial development of a magnificent mountain backcountry. Success stories are rare in the environmental field, and this ‘win’ in the Wyoming Range was a big one.” —Fred Swanson, author of Where Roads Will Never Reach (University of Utah Press 2015)
Cache Creek: A Trailside Guide to Jackson Hole's Backyard Wilderness
An illustrated guide and celebration of the natural wonders of Cache Creek, in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. One of the area's most popular network of trails can surprise you if you look more closely. Photos and other illustrations by the author.
"Susan Marsh doesn't simply walk in the outdoors--she absorbs it, she becomes part of it. Moreover, she can write about what she knows and what she feels. A book to appreciate." --Bert Raynes, noted naturalist and author
The Wild Wyoming Range
The Wild Wyoming Range is a hardcover coffee-table book featuring the author's photographs and essays, co-edited with Ronald Chilcote. Its intent is to bring to the reader's attention a lesser-known area near the national parks of Wyoming, a place deserving of appreciation.