Stephen Grace

Stephen Grace studied novel writing with Stratis Haviaras, founding editor of Harvard Review, while caretaking a house where the poet T. S. Eliot lived. After his debut novel was published to wide acclaim, Grace moved to a trailer park in Wyoming in the wake of the Matthew Shepard murder to work with at-risk youth while researching another novel. To publish a book about the historical cartography of Colorado, Grace collaborated with Library of Congress curators and with Vincent Virga, called "America's foremost picture editor." To research a narrative nonfiction book about China he sought out experiences as diverse as exploring Shanghai and trail running in Tibet. To write DAM NATION: HOW WATER SHAPED THE WEST AND WILL DETERMINE ITS FUTURE, a Colorado Book Award finalist, he followed rivers west of the 100th meridian and charted currents throughout the region's history. Grace served as a consultant for the award-winning film DamNation, and he was an associate producer and the screenwriter for the award-winning film THE GREAT DIVIDE. He is also the author of THE GREAT DIVIDE, a companion book to the film. While writing GROW: STORIES FROM THE URBAN FOOD MOVEMENT, winner of the 2016 Colorado Book Award for Creative Nonfiction, he worked on a repurposed garbage truck in the alleyways of Denver and volunteered on a farm in Uganda. In his most recently published book, OIL AND WATER, Grace teams up with an oilman to tell the story of the upper Colorado River, a resource under siege.