For fifth-generation Coloradan Shelley Read, the landscapes of the Western Slope are more than the setting of her debut novel, Go as a River. They’re part of her own story.
Growing up, Shelley swam in the waters of Blue Mesa Reservoir, fascinated by the knowledge that towns lay beneath its surface. She wondered about the ranchers and farmers displaced, as well as the Ute people who had been forced from their ancestral lands along the Gunnison River generations earlier.
That curiosity, combined with stories from Shelley’s own Colorado roots, eventually helped shape Victoria Nash, the young woman at the center of Go as a River. Set in mid-20th-century Colorado, the novel follows Victoria through love, loss, and survival against a landscape of mountains, rivers, and peach orchards.
The distinctly Colorado story has traveled remarkably far. Go as a River became an international bestseller, sending Shelley across the U.S. and Europe to meet readers. Along the way, she has also returned to familiar Colorado stops, including Denver’s Tattered Cover, Townie Books in Crested Butte, and Wilkinson Public Library in Telluride.
“It has been absolutely extraordinary to be out book touring across the U.S. and Europe, talking to readers about glorious Colorado peaches and the Colorado wilderness and history that I love so much,” Shelley says. “It’s a true testament to how special our state’s landscape and people are that this novel has had such cross-cultural appeal.”
For all the excitement of taking her work around the world, the Colorado stops feel different.
“In Colorado, I rarely need to explain my deep love of mountains and rivers and wild landscapes, since these are values that most of us share,” she says. “When I’m book touring in Colorado, I feel a beautiful sense of home and belonging with every audience.”
Among those home-state appearances, Crested Butte’s annual Mountain Words Festival remains a favorite. This year brought an especially meaningful encounter when Shelley met one of her literary idols, Terry Tempest Williams, and had the chance to tell the author how profoundly her work had influenced Shelley’s own life and writing.
The success of Go as a River has also ushered in a new chapter.
After nearly 30 years teaching writing and literature at Western Colorado University, of her debut novel, Go as a River. Shelley is now a full-time author, balancing a busy touring schedule with work on her second novel.
“It’s definitely a challenge to be both on the road talking to large audiences and attending book festivals while also working on my second novel,” she says. I absolutely loved being a teacher for nearly thirty years, but everything has its season, and it is finally my season to be the author I always knew I could be. I am savoring every moment.”
Perhaps most meaningful is discovering just how widely a story rooted in one particular corner of Colorado can resonate. For Shelley, the international reception of Go as a River has become a reminder that a deeply local story can also be a universal one.
“In these divisive times, it is a beautiful thing for a book to remind us of our shared values and that we are all far more alike than we are different,” she says. “There is no better feeling for a writer than this.”
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