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See the Famous Sights of Hillerman Country

Hillerman Country: Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, and Colorado

By Janis Turk

The four corners of mystery writer Tony Hillerman’s world aren’t on any map.

They lie someplace between fiction and fantasy, myth and memory, and are bordered by ancient cliff dwellings, steep canyon walls, sun-baked Zuni pueblos and dry winds that sweep across Navajo lands.

So the best way to experience Hillerman Country is to go by the book.

Take along some of Hillerman’s 20 best-selling novels while traveling through Arizona , Utah , New Mexico, and Colorado , and see the Four Corners region of the Southwest through new eyes.

Hillerman recalls it as “love at first sight,” when he first beheld the Four Corners region, and says he’s “been getting acquainted with its mountains, canyons, and interesting cultures ever since,” and so have his readers, who have fallen in love with Hillerman’s characters and the rugged country where his murder mysteries are set.

That’s why many well-read travelers are taking to the open road to discover the places shrouded in mystery and enchantment in Hillerman’s novels.

A Special Tour

While you can “go by the book” all on your own, using Hillerman’s tales as your guide, you may want to also consider taking a tour to learn more about the lands and peoples which inhabit the stories.

Three years ago, popular, award-winning mystery writer Tony Hillerman did something almost unheard of for an author of his stature: he endorsed a special “Hillerman Country” tour offered by Scottsdale-based Detours of Arizona.

This laid-back literary road trip takes travelers, for five days and four nights, through miles of high desert mountain lands and rocky canyon paths that fictional characters, like Navajo Tribal Police Jim Chee, Officer Bernadette Manuelito, and Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn have covered hundreds of times in Hillerman’s stories. Better yet, travelers get to meet some of Hillerman’s real-life friends who appear as colorful characters in his novels.

High, Dry, Big Sky Landscapes

Trekking across the canyonlands of northern Arizona and northwest New Mexico, home of the Navajo, Hopi, Zuni, and other American Indian tribes, travelers get to know the “friendly high, dry, big sky landscape of the Four Corners world” that Hillerman first beheld in 1945, a world he’s been writing about ever since.

The tour covers 1,100+ miles of glorious rugged country, including a jeep tour of Canyon de Chelly, which is the setting for parts of Sacred Clowns , as well as a walking tour of the ruins of Chaco Canyon, prominent in Hillerman’s Thief of Time .

The tour starts with a pick-up from the Phoenix Sun Harbor airport or from area hotels in Scottsdale, Mesa, and Phoenix, and those who travel on their own may want to start there too, as they can make their way up Carefree Highway (Hwy 17) toward Flagstaff, with a small detour off to the west on Hwy 179 for a stop in the popular town of Sedona. From there, travel north to the Grand Canyon, where Hillerman country really begins.

Sacred Places

Maverick Helicopters skip like stones across the top of the Grand Canyon to remind readers of Skeleton Man , the novel in which a diamond-filled attaché case and dismembered arm are found in a Havasu cave.Later stop at Zuni and Hopi reservations n

ear Four Corners, including a rare visit into private homes and sacred places there — settings for mysteries in Hillerman’s books, like Dance Hall of the Dead , Coyote Waits , Skinwalkers and The Wailing Wind .Along the way, windswept red-rock canyons and towering monoliths line the highways.

The snow-capped peaks of Mount Humphreys hold a regal place outside Flagstaff, in the distance. Dining at local lunch spots and trading posts like the one in Cameron, Arizona, with its fabulous Navajo taco on the menu, or stops at places like Tuba City or Toadlena, New Mexico, with its Two Grey Hills Weaving Museum, prove unforgettable as well. Wend through golden aspen groves until coming upon the ghostly shadow of Shiprock Mountain.

Colorful Characters

For Hillerman fans, the best part of the trip is meeting the real-life inspirations for fictional characters prominent in Hillerman’s novels, men such as a highly respected Navajo scholar, teacher, and silversmith named James Peshlakai, who appears as a Navajo shaman in The Wailing Wind . Peshlakai is a long-time friend of Tony Hillerman, and stories of their friendship and of how he came to be in a couple of Hillerman’s novels are as fascinating as he is.

During the tour, guests enjoy visiting with Peshlaki over lunch, and he sometimes invites them into his home on the Navajo reservation near Cameron, where his wife, Mae, maybe at work crafting stunning turquoise and silver jewelry at her kitchen table.

Likewise, tour guests are able to spend an hour or so conversing with Bob Rosebrough, a recent former mayor of Gallup, New Mexico, and rappelling enthusiast, who inspired a character with his name in Fallen Man , a rock climber who is lifted by helicopter on to the top of Shiprock Mountain in New Mexico where a body was found. Rosebrough had been a great fan before writing to Hillerman to ask if he’d consider writing about Shiprock and a fallen climber whose death is now part of local lore.

The writer and fan went on to work together on research for Fallen Man , and now Rosebrough and Shiprock are part of Hillerman’s lore as well. Even if you’ve never read a Hillerman novel, this tour is fascinating — and don’t worry: there’s no pop quiz at the end of the journey.

Movie Stars of a Bygone Era

One needn’t be a Hillerman fan to understand the allure of the canyonlands of the Southwest or to get your kicks on historic Route 66, traveling down memory lane with plenty of stops at soda fountains, trading posts and “kitschy” fab hotels, like Hotel El Rancho in Gallup, which boasts wagon-wheel lamps and rustic rooms, each named after the movie stars of a bygone era who slept there more than a half-century ago.

If you go by the book, with a Hillerman novel tucked under your arm and a spirit of adventure in your breast, you’re sure to fall in love with America’s rugged southwest. So take a detour on Arizona’s Carefree Highway and explore the mystery of Hillerman Country.

IF  IF YOU GO:

Check these sites for more information about Tony Hillerman and the Four Corners region:•

Tony Hillerman’s official HarperCollins website •

Grand Canyon National Park •

Canyon de Chelly National Monument •

Chaco Culture National Historical Park •

Detours of Arizona • Maverick Helicopters –

READING LIST

Recommended by Hillerman Country guide Michael Dean:• Tony Hillerman’s Navajoland: Hideouts, Haunts, and Havens in the Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee Mysteries by Laurance D. Linford with a foreword by Tony Hillerman• Navajo Places: History, Legend, Landscape by Laurance D. Linford• The Book of the Navajo by Raymond Friday Locke

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5 thoughts on “ See the Famous Sights of Hillerman Country ”

Is the Hillerman tour still being offered? What’s the cost?

Are Hillerman tours still being offered? I have just finished re-reading all of Tony Hillerman’s novels and am almost finished reading Anne Hillerman’s novels that continue the saga.

I too would like to go on the Hillerman country tour. Please send info to [email protected]

I would like to go on this tour, too.

when does this tour take place and what are the numbers associated with it?

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Tony Hillerman’s Mile-High Multiculturalism

Creator of savvy Native American sleuths, author Tony Hillerman cherished his Southwestern high desert home

Tony Hillerman

Editor’s note, Oct. 28, 2008: Tony Hillerman, whose bestselling mystery novels centered on the Navajo region of the American Southwest, died on Sunday at the age of 83. In 2006, Hillerman reflected on Albuquerque and its environs, where he had found a home and inspiration for 18 novels.

Why is Los Ranchos de Albuquerque my kind of town? First, our mile-high, big-sky, cool-night, dry climate. Second, mountains in all directions, reminding you of aspens, pines and silent places. Next, there's the Rio Grande right behind our neighborhood, its shady bosque, or grove, providing habitat for coyotes, porcupines, squirrels, and parking spaces for the assorted geese, duck and crane flocks on their seasonal migrations.

Such assets are common in the Mountain West. Nor can we claim exclusive title to the bosque, since it lines the river from its origin in the Colorado Rockies to its mouth at the Gulf of Mexico. It is the longest strip of unbroken woodland in North America, and probably the narrowest.

The network of irrigation ditches, or acequias, fed by the Rio Grande allows us to believe we are still a farming village. Water still flows to our hayfields, orchards, vineyards and gardens. Yet we also enjoy urban advantages offered by the City of Albuquerque, which has engulfed us. I am one of those country boys who left the farm but couldn't forget it. For me, living in a farm village with city pleasures at hand is a joy.

While we declare our independence—and have our own city hall, firetrucks, mayor and council, and post reduced speed limits on city streets that pass through our village—mapmakers, the U.S. Postal Service and political and commercial agencies all see us as Albuquerqueans. In the census we are just 5,000 of a half-million citizens who make it New Mexico's major metropolis. Officially urbanites, we drive downtown enjoying the perfume of new-mown alfalfa and the sight of grazing horses. And our nocturnal quiet is punctuated only by occasional yips and honks in the bosque—the honks from the geese whose sleep has been disturbed by the coyotes stalking them.

The map of Los Ranchos on the wall in our little city hall shows a crazily shaped place. It runs along the east bank of the Rio Grande, 7,000 yards long (north to south) and much narrower east to west, varying from as little as a short block in some places to perhaps 3,000 yards at its widest. When I asked a former mayor of Los Ranchos for a brief description, he offered this summary: "Four square miles with 5,000 cranky people five miles from downtown Albuquerque."

Those miles are anything but square, and the "cranky" adjective reflects only those angry enough to call on city hall. However, as the mayor said, the downtown buildings (skyscrapers by Mountain West standards) do loom just to the south, and "Old Town"—the heart of Albuquerque before the railroad came through—is just four miles down Rio Grande Boulevard from my house.

The survival of our village, and many others, is due to a quirk in history and to geography. History allowed our Pueblo villages, and their water rights, to escape European colonization. And geography made Albuquerque a crossroads. The Rio Grande was the north-south road, and the Tijeras Canyon between the Sandia Mountain ridge and the Manzano Mountains funneled east-west traffic through us.

Many of those villages that formed along the Rio Grande in the 18th and 19th centuries bore the names of pioneer Spanish families. Some grew into towns, such as Bernalillo and Los Lunas. Some faded away, and some survive as Albuquerque "neighborhoods."

History preserved our acequias for us through a treaty. When the Mexican-American War ended, the West was won for us. But Mexico insisted in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo that our laws respect the rights the Spanish king had given the Pueblo Indians and subsequently granted Spanish settlers, rights that the Mexican Republic had honored after winning its independence from Spain. Thus, people who own land along the ditches still retain rights to their water until they sell those rights. Thus, water still flows down our ditches.

The root cause for our water rights dates back to when the Franciscan friars accompanying the conquistadors disagreed with the army about colonial policies. The friars argued that the Pueblo Indians were " Gente de razón ," and as reasonable people should be treated properly and converted to Christianity. King Charles agreed, ruling that these Indians were his royal subjects and granting them rights to their lands.

We can also credit the friars with making our villages unusually multilingual, multicultural places. Indian pueblos surround us. Sandia and Zia just to the north, Isleta just down the river, Laguna and Acoma to the west, and Jemez to the north. The British had no such placid policy for accepting Indians into their East Coast colonies. The mortality rate among those tribes is estimated at more than 90 percent, mostly due to the introduction of European diseases.

Thus, while we are officially bilingual only in English and Spanish, we have neighbors who speak Tewa, Keresan, Tiwa, Navajo, Zuni, Hopi and a few other languages of tribes in the Mountain West. The artisans among them come into Albuquerque's popular Old Town plaza and sell their jewelry and pottery. The multimillion-dollar gambling casinos they have built along our highways provide us entertainment while siphoning off our surplus funds.

I credit another merger of history and geography for causing the city that envelops us to develop the way it has. In the 1940s an isolated place was needed to build the atomic bomb. Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, in charge of the project, was familiar with the Los Alamos boys' academy atop the Pajarito Plateau in the Jemez Mountains, utterly empty except for the school. The Los Alamos Laboratory was built there; in nearby Albuquerque was Kirtland Air Force Base and Sandia Laboratory. Then the top-secret Manzano Base grew, where we locals believe vast stacks of nuclear weapons are stored deep in the heart of the adjoining mountain. The labs drew spinoff, high-tech support companies. The cold war heated. Albuquerque, which had been a trading center for farmers, ranchers and miners, was flooded with physicists, engineers, computer technicians and other high-skill thinkers of every sort.

This wasn't the first time that progress had a drastic impact on our town. In 1880 the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad decided to roll through our crossroads. Rumor had it that it would bid for land at Albuquerque to build a depot, various maintenance structures and space for housing and business sites. But the availability of cheaper, more stable land led the railroad to move its site about two miles to the east. Albuquerque split. What was originally Albuquerque quickly became "Old Town." The bustling railroad terminus was "New Town." A trolley service opened to join them, but the split never healed. New Town is now Downtown, and Old Town is a lively tourist center, which is another reason I like living here. Visitors to Old Town learn that the Confederates buried their cannon as they retreated down the Rio Grande. They also learn that the Church of San Felipe de Neri on the plaza is the original (with remodeling), founded not long after the colonial governor decided in 1706 this village was important enough to be recognized and named after the tenth duke of Alburquerque. They aren't told that it wasn't until 1956, when we invited the current duke of Alburquerque to come join our 250th anniversary celebration, that we found he had been misspelling our mutual name for 250 years.

The fact that no one has yet suggested we reinsert the missing "r" reflects the relaxed attitude of this place, and that appeals to me. So does the name we've given our minor-league baseball team. They were the Dukes, recognizing our kinship with the royal family. But whoever bought our franchise took the Dukes name with it. We voted on a new name, and the Dukes are now the Isotopes.

Another reason why this is my town is our personal Sandia Mountain—called that by the Spanish because sunsets painted its cliffs watermelon red. It rises to more than 11,000 feet at Albuquerque's city limits, making it convenient for skiers and hang gliders, rock climbers and lovers of long views. The ski run is served by America's longest aerial tram, which means I can leave my home 5,000 feet above sea level and be inhaling cold, thin air two miles high in less than an hour.

From the crest the view is spectacular. Eighty miles west, the sacred Turquoise Mountain rises on the horizon. Northwest, the volcano peak called Cabezon juts into the sky. South, there's Ladron Peak. After dark, the lights of Santa Fe appear at the base of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, and the lights of Los Alamos on the rim of the Jemez Mountain range. Along the Rio Grande Valley, the lights of more than half the population of New Mexico are visible—including my Los Ranchos porch light.

As beautiful as these lights are, the oceans of darkness that surround them have their own appeal. Those dark spaces represent thousands of square miles of mountains, mesas and plains occupied by absolutely no one. I am one of those who treasures such empty, silent, untouched places. From Los Ranchos, they are easy to reach.

Tony Hillerman' s 18 mystery novels featuring Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn include, most recently,  The Shape Shifter  (2006) and  Skeleton Man  (2004).

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Anthony Grove Hillerman (1925-2008) was an award-winning author of southwestern literature. This website is a comprehensive online resource for researchers and students who wish to learn more about the author, his life, and work. This site hosts digital reproductions of Hillerman's manuscripts, screenplays and papers, as well as a complete catalog of his published works. You will also find a library of interviews, media appearances, articles and reviews, along with extensive biographical information. Additional materials are being added on a regular basis, so please check back often to see what's new on the site. The Tony Hillerman Portal is hosted by the University of New Mexico College of University Libraries and Learning Sciences.

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• Educational & Geographic Maps

The Hillerman Indian Country Map & Guide

$ 22.00

Featuring locations and descriptions from both Tony and Anne Hillerman Mysteries

A must have for old and new fans! Time Traveler Maps announces a new edition of the popular Hillerman Indian Country Map & Guide. This companion map features a 36”x 28” illustrated map highlighting the works of both Tony and Anne Hillerman. Over 80 plot locations and descriptions from 20 different Chee, Leaphorn, and Manuelito mysteries allow the reader to follow each mystery as they unfold.

This illustrated map and guide allows the reader to follow the Hillerman crime fighters in their various mysteries set in the heart of Indian Country in the American Southwest. Each plot location is numbered with a book icon.

Peter Thorpe, the designer of the jackets of the popular book series, illustrates this unique piece with original graphic art and his distinctive book icons.

Flat map 24” X 36”, folded to 4 7/8” X 9”, Hard cover, with ¼” spine.

Additional information

Tony Hillerman Books In Order

Publication order of leaphorn & chee books, publication order of standalone novels, publication order of short story collections, publication order of children's books, publication order of non-fiction books, publication order of anthologies.

Anthony (Tony) Grove Hillerman was born in Sacred Heart, Oklahoma in 1925. He was the youngest of three children. His father was a farmer and store keeper. From 1930-1938, Tony Hillerman attended St. Mary’s Academy, a boarding school that was primarily for Native American girls.

It was here that he developed an understanding and appreciation of the Native American culture which influenced the subject matter of his books. In high school he attended another primarily Native American school, Konawa High School.

After a brief stint in college, Hillerman returned home to the farm to work. In World War II, he became a decorated war veteran, serving as a mortarman for the 103rd Infantry Division. While in the military, Hillerman received a Bronze Star, a Silver Star, and a Purple Heart.

After World War II, he worked as a journalist (1948-1962). Tony Hillerman then attained a master’s degree. With his degree, Hillerman taught journalism at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It was in New Mexico that Tony Hillerman began his career as a novelist.

He first became famous for his unique, supernatural Navajo series, which featured 18 books. Throughout his career, Hillerman wrote more than 30 books. He was also noted for writing several memoirs about his life in the Southwest and the history of the Southwest.

As a result, Tony Hillerman was ranked as the 22nd wealthiest man in New Mexico in 1996. Career Hillerman is one of the most decorated writers in New Mexico history. He has received a number of literary honors for his critically acclaimed Navajo series.

He was awarded the Parris Award by the Southwest Writer’s Workshop for his dedication to improving the writing careers for other writers. Hillerman’s work is known around the United States and throughout the world. His books have been translated into more than eight languages including, Dutch and Japanese.

Tony Hillerman’s work is known for the flawless cultural details he presents in the series. Much of the content of his books, deal with the inter-relationships of Native American tribes, federal agents, the Navajo Tribal Police, and European-Americans.

Both his non-fiction and fictional work is a reflection of his childhood respect and admiration for the beauty of the American Southwest, the Native American culture, and the Navajo people. Hillerman’s mystery novels take place in the American Southwest.

The areas of New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado are the main areas, but his mysteries extend to Los Angeles and all the way to Washington, DC. The main character in his Navajo series is Joe Leaphorn, and Jim Chee, two officers in the Navajo Tribal police.

Hillerman’s first novel and smash success was The Blessing Way (1970), and introduced the universe of the Navajo Tribal police and the character Joe Leaphorn. His second novel, Dance Hall of the Dead (1973), received an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America.

Hillerman received the Mystery Writers of America’s Grand Master Award in 1991. Later Hillerman received Navajo Tribes’ Special Friends of Dineh Award for his representation of the Navajo people in an award winning novel series. He also received the Nero Award for his novel Coyote Waits.

Hillerman has always acknowledged the earlier writings of author Arthur W. Upfield, books set among the aborigine people in Australia, as an inspiration to him. The Upfield novels were published in 1928 and featured Detective Napoleon Bonaparte. The character, along with his sidekick, investigated supernatural events in the desert.

The Leaphorn and Chee Books 

The Navajo series is also known as the Leaphorn and Chee books. The series has a few recurring themes, many of which revolve around the differing attitude of Leaphorn and Chee. Leaphorn is a skeptic but does take the notion of witchcraft seriously. While he doesn’t believe in witchcraft, he believes that people who believe in witches are dangerous.

Even though he does not think the supernatural is real, he does respect Navajo tradition and takes his job and his cases very seriously. Chee holds more traditional Navajo beliefs. As a follower of Navajo traditions, Chee is also a practicing shaman, in his spare time when he is not chasing down supernatural mysteries with Joe Leaphorn.

Throughout the novels, Leaphorn and Chee investigate a variety of cases of the supernatural and witchcraft. Other novels deal with their relationships with the “white man” and the Navajo culture. Readers will notice that Hillerman often refers to characters by descriptive nicknames.

For example, a murder victim is called “Pointed Shoes.” The Blessing Way Hillerman’s first novel of the series features anthropologist Bergen McKee who comes to the Navajo Reservation to investigate reports of witchcraft.

At the same time, Joe Leaphorn investigates the murder of a person found with a mouth full of sand. Soon both McKee and Leaphorn are in danger as they investigate the disappearance of an electronics expert. Dance Hall of the Dead This book is the second book in the popular Leaphorn and Chee series.

When a young Navajo and his Zuni friend disappear, Leaphorn is asked to investigate the disappearance of the Navajo boy. When the Navajo boy’s friend, Ernesto, is found dead, the need to find the boy grows.

Television and Film Adaptations

Several of Tony Hillerman’s books have been adapted into television films. The Dark Wind (1991), Skinwalker (2002), Coyote Waits (2003), A Thief of Time (2004), and Skinning the Night: American Mystery (DVD release). Skinwalker was a television film success with an all star cast.

The film was produced as a part of the popular PBS Mystery! Series. These films have featured some notable stars like; Lou Diamond Phillips, Adam Beach, and Wes Studi. Anthony Hillerman’s love for the Southwest, and the Native American culture, has led to the creation of an award winning body of work.

Hillerman’s books are known and loved for their powerful and accurate descriptions of the Southwestern area, its history and the Navajo experience. Tony Hillerman has also produced a number of memoirs as well, but Hillerman’s most prolific work was the Leaphorn and Chee series.

8 Responses to “Tony Hillerman”

My father was an avid reader of Tony Hillerman’s for decades before my parents moved to Arizona. Later, I began reading them after we moved to Arizona and was soon addicted. A love for the American southwest coupled with having visited many of the places in the series keeps me coming back for more, and Anne Hillerman has done her father proud since taking over the series.

Hillerman’s Leaphorn and Chee books are excellent and can be read and re-read. I am always amazed at how these series authors make all their books similar and different. We should all be so blessed as to Go With Beauty.

I’m a real fan. I’ve lived in the southwest and the Hillerman books can put you right there. Very excited that Anne is continuing the work. I have a well-read collection and love re-visiting them from time to time.

I was introduced to Mr. Hillerman’s work via Amazon’s airing of the series “Dark Winds”. I am glad that I viewed the series before reading the books as, Book 1 did not have piqued my interest. Now that I’ve read Books 1-5 and experienced the development of Tony’s writing, as well as introduction and growth of characters, I am HOOKED. Unfortunately, my small town’s library or its network of regional sources do not have most of the books (they were able to locate Book 1). As my budget allows, I am purchasing the series and donating to the local public library. I believe readers who watch the series will want to enjoy the books as much as I.

I still have to get his latest books but still read many of the older books again. It is interesting to note that Arthur W Upfield was someone Tony Hillerman respected as we have all the Upfield books and these are treasured as are Hillermann books. I would have loved to have met Tony Hillerman and a visit to the Navajo area is still on my list for the future. He is missed by all of his numerous fans and we are lucky in England to be able to read his books.

His book Fly on the Wall (1973) although not a Leaphorn &Chee book is an excellent tale mixing journalism and politics. It’s apropos now (2022)

We lost one of our greatest mystery writers when Mr. Hillerman passed. But, the good is that his stories and characters will live on. I have reread many of his works many times and they continue to bring me much joy and entertainment. Thank you Tony Hillerman and God Bless you.

One of my favorite authors.

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Hillerman Country: A Journey Through the Southwest With Tony Hillerman Hardcover – January 1, 1991

Purchase options and add-ons.

• Print length 240 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Harpercollins
• Publication date January 1, 1991
• Dimensions 9.75 x 1 x 12.25 inches
• ISBN-10 006016400X
• ISBN-13 978-0060164003
• See all details

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• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Harpercollins; 1st edition (January 1, 1991)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 240 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 006016400X
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0060164003
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.7 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 9.75 x 1 x 12.25 inches
• Best Sellers Rank: #545,024 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books )

About the author

Tony hillerman.

Tony Hillerman was the former president of the Mystery Writers of America and received its Edgar® and Grand Master awards. His other honors include the Center for the American Indian's Ambassador Award, the Silver Spur Award for the best novel set in the West, and the Navajo Tribe's Special Friend Award. He lived with his wife in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

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Customers find the pictures beautiful and the writing style nice. They also describe the characters as sensitive and loving. Readers appreciate the wonderful quality and service on a rare book.

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Customers find the pictures in the book beautiful.

"A truly beautiful , enchanting, expressive, loving, accomplishment! Mere words to describe it, seem tame...." Read more

"...novels make great use of the landscape this book shows the landscape in amazing color photographs with commentary by Tony Hillerman." Read more

" Excellent pictures , sometimes covering both left and right-hand pages, by Tony's brother and evocative prose by Tony himself. A very enjoyable read...." Read more

" Great illustration and description of New Mexico/Southwest. Very good used condition, and arrived promptly as scheduled." Read more

Customers find the writing style nice and excellent.

"A truly beautiful, enchanting, expressive , loving, accomplishment! Mere words to describe it, seem tame...." Read more

"...many of the photos but I give it 5 stars because of the content of the text by the author ." Read more

" Excellent read . I'll be driving through that same area this fall and plan to align my drive with the information in this book." Read more

"Beautiful pictures, well written . I have been a Hillerman fan for decades." Read more

Customers find the characters in the memoir sensitive and loving. They also describe the book as beautiful, enchanting, and expressive.

"A truly beautiful, enchanting, expressive, loving , accomplishment! Mere words to describe it, seem tame...." Read more

"...A very enjoyable read. You get a good emotional sense of the SW desert." Read more

"...It is a sensitive and loving memoir of why this land meant so much to him and it will amke you want to go there to see it yourself." Read more

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"Great illustration and description of New Mexico/Southwest. Very good used condition , and arrived promptly as scheduled." Read more

"...The content of the book is in really good condition just the taped covers. For the price I am keeping it was just a little surprised for used good." Read more

" Wonderful quality and service on a hard to find book which sells for much, much more on other sites" Read more

Customers find the book's subject matter interesting and mystical. They also say it's full of facts and pictures of the Southwest.

"...Mere words to describe it, seem tame. Mystical , almost Magical Pictures, and yes, Prose!..." Read more

"...Contains a lot of good pictures and some interesting information ." Read more

"Beautiful book. Full of facts and pictures of Southwest ." Read more

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The Four Corners of Tony Hillerman's World

Saturday, march 10, 2007, detours - tony hillerman tour.

Or several books, that is ...

Slade, one of the owners and guides of Detours of Arizona's "off the beaten path" tours sent me an entire list of books I should read before going to Arizona for the Detours Tony Hillerman Country tour. It's not that I needed to be a Hillerman expert, or even know anything about Hillerman's page-turning mysteries before the trip--for with or without reading Hillerman, this promised to be a great ride. However, Slade knew if I read Hillerman's books, it would whet my appetite for the adventure that lay ahead. Soon I would be trekking through the canyon lands and Navajo country of northern Arizona and eastern New Mexico.

Of course, as is my nature, at the last minute I picked up five Hillerman books at the library just one day before my trip, and I began to read. The tour would be a whirlwind five-day introduction to the places and people Hillerman loves and writes about in his novels.

Through the books, I became acquainted with characters Jim Chee, Lt. Joe Leaphorn and Bernadette Manuelito. I learned a bit about Navajo culture, tribal police business and places as mysterious and haunting as their names: Chaco Canyon, Canyon de Chelly, Zuni Pueblo and more.

Reading brings whole new worlds to life, and travel brings books to life, too. I hope you'll take the time to read some of Hillerman's work, for he so beautifully captures the spirit of the people and the places I saw in the specatcular Four Corners region.

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Tony Hillerman: An Open Book

He may have been a master mystery writer, but to those who knew him, what you saw was what you got—a man of the people who wore many hats well. An oral history of a New Mexico hero.

“HILLERMAN!” That’s how New Mexico’s favorite mystery writer answered the phone—with a newspaperman’s gruff bark. It was all bluff and habit. He loved people. Everyday folks, cops, aspiring writers, fellow authors, autograph-seeking fans, sheepherders, striking union workers ... even politicians and students.

Millions more knew Tony Hillerman through his award-winning Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee mystery novels. I got to know him when I studied journalism at the University of New Mexico in the late 1970s. He was admired but not yet famous. As a teacher and a mentor, Hillerman helped me in countless ways, as he did so many other writers.

He never seemed to mind getting a call at home or, in later years, stopping to chat at Flying Star Cafe on Rio Grande Boulevard in Albuquerque, a mile from his house. The topic was usually writing. Did I need a blurb for my novel? Sure, he’d write one. Should I contact his editor at HarperCollins? Here’s her phone number. Or he’d deliver a perplexed, peevishly resigned lament about losing the latest Leaphorn or Chee manuscript in the digital bowels of his computer. A friend would always eventually scrape it out of some autorecovery file pit.

Those Navajo detective stories occupied huge tracts of mental territory in the overachieving Hillerman brain. Other things occupied him, too, mind and body: newspaper reporting, New Mexico politics, family, the Navajo Nation, the university classroom, anthropology, church, campus politics, movies, fishing, and the weekly poker game. That game spanned decades and gripped Hillerman so tightly that he once put off Robert Redford when the Hollywood legend wanted to meet about a film option on poker night. Priorities. It wasn’t about the cards, it was about the friends. Everything he did, poker included, fed his creative imagination; the smallest tidbit might spawn a paragraph, a page, or an entire plot in one of his novels.

To know the man, one friend says, you have to understand his hardscrabble upbringing. Born Anthony Grove Hillerman in 1925 in Sacred Heart, Oklahoma, he grew up poor and happy, attended an Indian girls’ school, and survived the Great Depression and World War II. After recovering from severe war wounds, Hillerman helped deliver a truckload of materials to the Navajo Nation, where he witnessed an Enemy Way ceremony for veterans returned from World War II, an event he drew upon in defining his future literary niche.

After attending the University of Oklahoma, Hillerman punched typewriter keys at small-town newspapers in Texas and Oklahoma. In 1952, the hand of destiny nudging his back, he and his wife, Marie, emigrated to Santa Fe. Their family grew to six children—Anne, the eldest, and her five adopted siblings, Jan, Tony Jr., Monica, Steve, and Dan. Hillerman soon became executive editor of the Santa Fe New Mexican , the capital daily.

In 1962, UNM president Tom Popejoy, another towering New Mexican, inflamed the American Legion by standing with faculty members critical of a certain loyalty oath. Popejoy delivered a ringing defense of free speech. Two days later, Hillerman published an editorial in the New Mexican siding with Popejoy and quoting Voltaire: “Liberty of thought is the life of the soul.” Impressed, Popejoy hired him as special assistant in 1963 and the family moved to Albuquerque. Hillerman helped Popejoy navigate tough legislative issues, reorganized the university news bureau, got his master’s in English, and chaired the journalism department. And now that he wasn’t cranking out news stories and editing the paper 60 hours a week, the yen to become a novelist hardened into an obsession.

By 1970 Hillerman had published The Blessing Way , the first of his genre-launching Navajo detective novels. Warm reviews rolled in. Book followed book and award followed award: the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award, the Western Writers of America’s Spur and Owen Wister awards, France’s Grand Prix de Littérature Policière, the Agatha Award, the Special Friend of the Dinétah (from the Navajo, for his authentic writing about them), and so on. Best sellers attracted film deals. Imitators popped up like goat-head weeds in June.

By 2008, when he died at 83 of pulmonary failure—he would have been 90 this year—Hillerman had written more than 30 books and was undoubtedly New Mexico’s most widely read author. A friend of his remembers Hillerman mentioning millions of books sold. Most by far were the Leaphorn or Chee mysteries—he wrote 18. The specter of the Great American Novel stalked Hillerman, but the detective stories earned his spot on the top shelf of New Mexico’s literary canon, alongside Frank Waters, Mary Austin, Max Evans, N. Scott Momaday, Rudolfo Anaya, Edward Abbey, John Nichols, Cormac McCarthy, and a handful of others. His impact was enormous: If you want to get the crosscultural complexities of late-20th-century Navajo life in New Mexico, Hillerman is indispensible.

What follows is a profile of Hillerman composed of recollections from his daughter, friends, peers, students, and others. From their reflections, a 3-D image materializes, hovering around their words, alive in their memories.

COUNTRY BOY

Hillerman attended St. Mary’s Academy, a school for girls from the nearby Potawatomi reservation. At one point, he organized—and gobbled up—the books in the local church’s library. He later checked out books by mail from the State Library of Oklahoma, from Pollyanna and Her Puppy to The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire .

Jim Belshaw, longtime columnist for the Albuquerque Journal and close poker buddy:  Tony told me once that his view of the world was formed growing up in Oklahoma. In his mind there were two kinds of people in the world, broadly speaking—city and country people. And he was country. They didn’t have power. City people had power.

No one I know talks like he writes. I’ve always wondered if people who met Hillerman for the first time were puzzled about this. In conversation, he might say something about “Eyetalians” and “heeliocopters.” He might tell you he went on the Internet and looked up something on “Goggle.” His spoken voice was very different from the one that came through his fingertips and onto a keyboard.

In 1943, Hillerman enlisted in the Army and was sent to fight Germans in France. He earned a Bronze Star, a Silver Star, and then a Purple Heart when he stepped on a landmine, which blew away his heel, hashed his leg, and peppered his eyes. With the help of experimental penicillin—a treatment unknown to him at the time—he recovered.

Max Evans, cowboy, native New Mexican, and award-winning author of The Hi Lo Country , The Rounders , and many other books: We never did talk about the war, the ones that actually fought in the infantry. But Tony and I had to laugh about it because we had it in common.

Anne Hillerman, daughter, journalist, and author who is carrying on the Chee-Leaphorn series with novels of her own: He never talked about the war. His autobiography was the only book he asked me to read before he published it, and I think it was because of the war stuff, even though he handled it lightly. He thought, “I wouldn’t be here if the Army hadn’t experimented

on these soldiers with penicillin.”

Jim Belshaw: Tony was an infantry grunt in World War II. That experience seemed to underlie much of the way he looked at the world. If you ever wanted to hear him talk about the abuse of power, all you had to do was ask him about a bad officer in an infantry unit.

Hillerman married Marie Unzner in 1948. And without her, we might not have had “Tony Hillerman.” In Seldom Disappointed , he credits her with giving him confidence to dive into writing novels: “It was because Marie (Oh, woman of infinite faith) got me to believing I was as talented, competent, etc. ... as she believed I was.”

Dick Pfaff, Hillerman’s friend since about 1964, a poker pal, and longtime business supervisor of student publications at UNM, where Hillerman served on the student publications board: You can’t know Tony if you don’t ask about Marie. He told me, “The best and smartest thing I ever did was talking Marie into marrying me.” He felt that so deeply. If anyone should be canonized by the Catholic Church, it’s Marie. She was always doing something for other people, and always compassionate.

Jim Belshaw: Tony and Marie were the kind of people that, if you could vote for who your next-door neighbors would be, these would be the two you’d vote for.

FROM NEWSPAPERMAN TO PROFESSOR

After returning from the war and recovering from his injuries, Hillerman studied journalism at the University of Oklahoma, then worked as a newspaperman, honing his observational and writing skills.

Dick Pfaff: By the time he was 40, he had said, he wanted to be the editor of a capital city newspaper, and here he was in his thirties and he was already there.

Anne Hillerman: I think a lot of journalists want to be novelists, maybe because we run into so many interesting characters. They’re bigger than life, but they are life. When he was at the New Mexican , almost every evening after dinner he’d be working on the novel at his rolltop desk in the bedroom at the back of the house. He wrote on a typewriter.

Part of his leaving the newspaper was his increasing desire to get that novel finished. I remember him and my mom having a conversation about it. We were pretty happy in Santa Fe, and moving a family of that size was an effort, but Mom said, “As long as you’re working as a journalist you won’t get that finished. ... I think we should move to Albuquerque.” He had to go back to school [at UNM] to get a master’s to teach. He was also writing magazine articles to supplement his income.

Melissa Howard, former Hillerman student and journalist: We never called him Tony. I started with him in 1966. He seemed to have no ego involved in it at all. As a former newspaper writer and editor and wire service writer, he was very comfortable that he knew the business, and he didn’t use a textbook.

Jim Belshaw: The first time I ever got a paper back from him in class [in 1970], I remember on one page he had circled a paragraph and wrote “Ugh!” in the margin. My heart sank. On the next page, another note said, “Good.” That was all I needed. I remember how quickly, in the space of two pages, all the wind went out of my sails, and suddenly the wind came back.

While Hillerman taught at UNM, he finished The Blessing Way (1970), featuring Navajo detective Joe Leaphorn. Next he wrote the political thriller The Fly on the Wall (1971). Then he returned to Leaphorn and—after selling the rights to Leaphorn—introduced Jim Chee, also Navajo. In later novels, the rights restored, Hillerman energized the stories by having the two cops work together, their distinct personalities and investigative methods creating an intriguing counterpoint.

N. Scott Momaday, Kiowa author who set his Pulitzer Prize–winning novel House Made of Dawn at Jemez Pueblo and who now teaches at UNM and St. John’s College in Santa Fe: He had possession of the spirit of story. He knew how to tell a story and he appreciated storytelling, as I do. We shared a confidence that story is universal and important. It’s at the heart of language, and he knew that.

Sheila Tryk, former New Mexico Magazine editor: He always came up with something fascinating. He’d approach you with a story and you’d say yes. You knew who would need massive editing, and he wasn’t one of them. He was a great storyteller, too, and it was sometimes hard to separate what he wrote from what he told you.

Fred Harris, author, former US senator from Oklahoma, presidential candidate, and UNM professor who attended the University of Oklahoma a few years after Hillerman, studying with many of the same professors: Tony’s prose was so spare. [One professor] taught him that adverbs are the enemy of verbs and adjectives are the enemies of nouns. I asked, “What do you mean?” And Tony says, “Instead of saying he walked slowly, say he ambled.”

Anne Hillerman: His idea was that he’d start with a mystery and go on to write more profound novels, but he discovered he really liked Joe Leaphorn and writing mysteries.

Craig Johnson, author of the Walt Longmire mystery series—now an A&E cable drama— who considered Hillerman a mentor: It’s the descriptive passages that blow me away. His dialogue is wonderful, his characters are great, but what makes me pull up on the reins and go whoa! is one of those magnificent descriptive passages that he does. He doesn’t take pages, he does it in just one paragraph—he encapsulates the vista, the geology, the color and the beauty and the magnificence of the Southwest. You learn from Hillerman that you become universal by giving the detail. It’s important to know exactly where that story takes place, who it is, and the time.

N. Scott Momaday: The land was important to him, and he did well by it. He had such a keen understanding of the Southwestern landscape and the Navajo reservation. He evoked the spirit of place extremely well. I rather think it was fortunate and to Tony’s advantage to have such a regional subject and specific cultural subject.

Dick Pfaff, recalling a boating trip on the San Juan River with Hillerman, who was the celebrity attraction: Four professional people were in one of the dories. One of them knew he was the smartest guy on the river, and he was determined to write. He wanted to know how Tony outlined his books. Tony said, “I don’t do that.” Then how do you know when to end? “I just get to the end.”

Fred Harris: I studied his writing, and I could never outline his books—I never figured out how they worked. ... When I got a two-book deal with HarperCollins, the contract said that for the second book, they would pay half the advance upon approval of an outline. I said to Tony, “I can’t outline a book in advance.” He said, “Neither can I. Don’t worry about it, just write up anything for the outline, and then turn in the book you want to do.”

Hillerman gave up teaching and left UNM to concentrate on writing novels in 1985.

Anne Hillerman: It wasn’t till Rupert Murdoch took over Harper & Row that Dad’s fiction really took off. Rupert picked writers with a strong following to do a breakout book combined with a book tour and more national promotion. It would make a difference. That was Skinwalkers [1986], which was Dad’s first on the New York Times best-seller list. Then every one was on the best-seller list.

Luther Wilson, former acquisitions editor at Harper & Row, director of UNM Press (and several other presses), and regular poker buddy: Very few writers make their living off writing. ... That pyramid is very narrow at the top.

Jim Belshaw, who traveled with Hillerman to the 1996 Super Bowl: Somebody noticed Hillerman was on the plane. The next thing we knew, a line of people almost the entire length of the plane waited patiently to get his autograph. From time to time, and with a big grin on his face, he’d look over at me and say, “You watching this?”

Tuesday [poker games] turned into a four-hour exercise in ego control: Here we had this man who was one of the best-selling authors in the world. If you didn’t know who he was, you’d never know that.

Craig Johnson: One great thing was his philosophy that you can’t help the people further up the career ladder, but you can help the people coming along behind you. He had an old-school graciousness that’s kind of a unique perspective for an author at that level of prestige. He’s the godfather of western mystery writing. A lot of big authors forget their humble beginnings.

Anne Hillerman: Dad didn’t allow much mythology to be built around him. He was the same guy in 2008, when he died, as he was in the 1940s, when he started in journalism.

NATIVE SPEAKER

In Seldom Disappointed, Hillerman writes about the literary agent who told him The Blessing Way was a “bad book” that he could improve by “getting rid of all the Indian stuff.”

Luther Wilson: [After World War II, Hillerman and his companions] stopped somewhere on the New Mexico side of the reservation. As far as he could tell, every person in the Navajo Nation had shown up to honor a few wounded Marines and go through a ceremony to get the evil out of them and reintegrate them back into Navajo society. He thought, “Why didn’t anybody do anything like that for me?” That’s what got him interested in the Navajos and interested in New Mexico. It turned out it was a great thing for the rest of the world.

Max Evans: He invented that style of writing about the reservation. A number followed him, but none were as successful as Tony.

Anne Hillerman: Originally the main character was going to be a white anthropologist, and Leaphorn would be his sidekick, but then as it developed, Dad realized Leaphorn was a much more interesting character, and luckily the editor at Harper did, too.

N. Scott Momaday: One of his strong points was his knowledge of the Southwest and of Navajo culture. I’m not sure how he came by that, but his Navajo characters are vivid and alive. The Indian has a keen understanding of that spirit of the land—it’s intrinsic to Indian life, and Tony knew that and he expressed that essence very well in his treatment of Native American culture and character.

Anne Hillerman: At UNM he had access to Zimmerman Library, which has wonderful collections of Navajo information. Dad always was very interested in religion, or in spiritual beliefs, how people imagine themselves as part of the bigger picture. And that was one of the things that really intrigued him about the Navajo—their cosmology and how complicated it was and how accepting it was of differences. That was part of his affection for the Navajo people and their culture. At UNM, he had Navajo students and he would build up relationships and go home and meet their folks. And, being a journalist, he wasn’t shy about calling up people and asking questions, and he had that good ol’ boy attitude. It wasn’t like talking to a college professor.

Fred Harris: You wouldn’t think the Navajos would accept a guy from the outside—they’d resent a white guy explaining Navajos to the world. He just empathized with them. He liked their humor. They were funny to be around. He could put himself in their shoes. He grew up with Indians and went to that Indian school.

James Peshlakai, Navajo medicine man and storyteller, who was translating Navajo to English when he met Hillerman and became a friend: We’d meet here and there and go out into the country [on the Navajo reservation] and just talk about little things. I told Tony about the plants. When we’d go walking someplace, he would ask questions: “What’s this? Do they grow in Crownpoint, too?” He had a very scientific mind. We would talk about how we teach each other to live together on this earth. He was very respectful that we [Navajos] don’t talk about death or religion. He’s the one that told us that the Navajo belief is not a religion at all—it’s metaphysical. He says, “Your belief is more like science than a religion. A religion is where people have hope, they wish for things, an afterlife.” Navajos, we don’t have heaven and don’t have hell.

Everybody wanted us to become white people and be assimilated into the American way of life. And then Tony Hillerman came along and started writing books about Navajos, and then our schools started using his books in literature classes, and the little kids started asking questions. He brought the young people’s interest back into their culture. Tony Hillerman woke us up to this.

Craig Johnson: Tony doesn’t get credit—being an Indian in 1968, when he was first writing, was not cool, not like it is nowadays. It was a bold decision to make, to have those characters be Native. But that’s kind of your job as an author: When everyone’s running in one direction, run in another direction. Here everyone was writing about cowboys, and this writer from New Mexico decided to write about Indians.

I hear Native people say they love this series with two Tontos—and the Lone Ranger never shows up!

Jim Belshaw: Who has and doesn’t have power—that’s always struck me as one of the reasons he was attracted to the Navajo people. He saw himself in them. He saw a culture that at least in one regard was very much like the one he’d grown up with—country boys and city boys. He was a country boy and so were the Navajo people, and they didn’t have power.

Hillerman joined a poker group at UNM in 1965. About a decade later, Jim Belshaw and UNM public relations director Jess Price started another game for lower stakes among professors and staffers, including their buddy Hillerman. Although the membership has shifted throughout the decades, a core cadre still plays. Anne Hillerman says “the poker guys” were his best friends outside of family.

Jim Belshaw: I never met a poker player so optimistic about two pair. If someone at the table had a megaphone and was announcing a full house, Tony would call with two pair in his hand. One night a player said, “Hillerman, I finally got around to reading The Fly on the Wall . I’ve got a question about that poker scene. The hero is a reporter, which I guess is supposed to be you. I want to know who wrote that poker scene for you. You have this hero folding and folding and folding. You never folded a hand in your life. You couldn’t have written that scene. So who did?”

John Perovich, former UNM president who helped interview Hillerman for a job at the university in 1963: Tony won his share. When he was young, he was a good poker player. I remember one time we went up to Red River and the legislators were having a poker game. I wasn’t invited to play, but Tony was. He did very well.

Jim Belshaw: Tony hated missing those games. He said they reminded him of what it felt like to be in his old Army squad. We still talk about him at the poker games. His presence is always very much there. When the chatter would get to be too much at the poker table, Tony would say, “Did you birds come to talk or to play poker?” He was the only one who could get away with saying it. The players would grumble and laugh, but they’d shut up. And then half the time, Hillerman would begin telling a story of his own. It was great fun. I miss him. I sense him every time we sit down and begin shuffling the deck.

“A PRETTY GOOD FELLER”

He was a devout Catholic, but his interest in metaphysics ranged widely.

Anne Hillerman: Dad was a regular Mass-goer, but he wasn’t didactic about it. He disagreed with a lot of the official positions. He said you can’t let the Church get in the way of God.

Jim Belshaw: People of that generation and upbringing didn’t talk about it. You do your good works and the Lord sees them. If you had something troublesome going on in your life and Tony and Marie found out about it, they had a way of letting you know you were in their prayer circle.

Dick Pfaff: His spirituality and his fairness and his forgiveness and his generosity were big parts of who he was. He believed in miracles, curiously. And Marie had compassion for every living thing in the world, and that splashed over to Tony, and he was therefore incredibly forgiving.

Max Evans: Tony Hillerman wasn’t just a fine writer. He was a true gentleman who had a genuine interest in other people’s lives. He was just as sincere as you could be, what we used to call when I was cowboying “a pretty good feller.” That was the greatest compliment ever.

HILLERMAN 101: A READING LIST

The Blessing Way (1970), the inaugural Joe Leaphorn mystery, taps Hillerman’s initial fascination with the healing power of Navajo metaphysics and psychology.

The Great Taos Bank Robbery  (1973) assembles a collection of Hillerman’s essays, including the title piece, first published in New Mexico Magazine . Read it for insight into mid-20th-century New Mexico.

Dance Hall of the Dead (1973) sends Joe Leaphorn outside the Navajo world to solve a mystery at Zuni Pueblo. In doing so, it punctures myths about a monolithic American Indian culture.

Hillerman Country (1991), a coffee-table book, provides Hillerman’s verbal tour of the places he wrote about, with photos by his brother, Barney. To reckon the man, reconnoiter the land he loved.

People of Darkness (1980) introduces Navajo Tribal Police sergeant Jim Chee, who’s magnetic south to the north set by his fictional predecessor and eventual collaborator, Joe Leaphorn. When Hillerman unites them in later books, their chemistry and conflict energize his cultural explorations.

Finding Moon (1995) breaks out of the mystery series all the way to Vietnam. Hillerman said it was “the closest I’ve come to writing a book that satisfied me.”

Seldom Disappointed (2001) treats the reader to several hours in Hillerman’s affable and astute company. It would be worth reading even if you’ve never read one of his mysteries. The World War II section alone earns the cover price.

The Wailing Wind (2002) explores complex relationships among Navajo heroes and Navajo villains. It’s eerie.

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HILLERMAN COUNTRY: A Journey Through the Southwest...

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HILLERMAN COUNTRY: A Journey Through the Southwest With Tony Hillerman, photographs in color by Barney Hillerman (HarperCollins: $39.95; 240 pp.) and THE BEST OF THE WEST: An Anthology of Classic Writing From the American West, edited by Tony Hillerman (HarperCollins: $25; 528 pp.). What makes a Tony Hillerman mystery so compelling? Deft plotting, to be sure; two intriguing heroes, both Navajo tribal policemen--the elderly, philosophical Joe Leaphorn and the younger, more emotive Jim Chee. But it is the landscape, finally--the Four Corners of the Southwest--that plays the chief (pardon the pun) role in his novels: Indian country--Navajo, Hopi, Zuni, Pueblo, etc. You don’t mind being given a break from the action to realize the drama and beauty of the story’s setting: “The cottonwoods along the river formed a crooked line of dazzling gold across a vast landscape of grays and tans. And beyond, the dark blue mountains formed the horizon, the Abajos, Sleeping Ute and the San Juans, already capped with early snow. It was one of those still, golden days of high desert autumn” (from “Coyote Waits”). Hillerman, and brother Barney, have produced a pleasing coffee-table book about the places far off the main highways cutting through the reservations of the Southwest. Hillerman’s text examines the weird disappearance of the Anasazi, tribal beliefs, the mountain ranges and rivers of the Four Corners, snippets of history, as well as a personally guided tour through some valleys and canyons he particularly cherishes. The photography is bold and sharp, capturing a rugged landscape that continues to fascinate and mystify visitors and inhabitants alike. “The Best of the West” is a fine, fat collection of fiction and nonfiction about the American frontier. You’ll find writings by Wallace Stegner, Oliver La Farge, Helen Hunt Jackson, Lawrence Clark Powell and Charles Lummis, just to name a few. A perfect duo for the armchair saddle tramp in your house!

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Tony Hillerman Library

8205 Apache NE  Albuquerque, NM 87110 505-291-6264 [email protected] Lisa Pate , Branch Manager

The Tony Hillerman Library (formerly the Wyoming Library) is located behind the Hoffmantown Shopping Center at the intersection of Wyoming Blvd and Menaul Blvd. on Apache Street NE. It is on a separate, irregularly shaped block with beautiful public rose gardens on each end adjoining the parking lots.

Route #8: Menaul and Route #31: Wyoming, both serve the Tony Hillerman Library. Plan your trip here .

Freeway directions: Take I-40 to the Wyoming exit and drive north on Wyoming Blvd. Look for the Wendy's Restaurant on the left side of the street just before Menual Blvd. Follow the surface street directions.

Surface Street Directions heading South on Wyoming Blvd: Cross Menual and turn right at the Wendy's Restaurant onto Apache Street.

Surface Street Directions heading North on Wyoming Blvd: Watch for the Wendy’s on your left as you approach Menaul Blvd. Turn Left at the Wendy’s onto Apache St.

Surface Street Directions heading West on Menaul Blvd: Turn left on Wyoming Blvd. Look for the Wendy’s on your right side and make a right turn onto Apache.

Surface Street Directions heading East on Menaul Blvd: Go three blocks east of Pennsylvania. Turn right into Inez Street at the western entrance to the Hoffmantown Shopping Center. Go one block south on Inez and you will see the library parking lot.

Meeting Rooms

Tony Hillerman has one meeting room that will hold a maximum of 35 people.  Policy, rules  and required forms for using the meeting room may be found at  Meeting and Study Rooms  as well as a list of meeting rooms at other branches. 

To view availability online, see our  online booking form .

Branch Amenities & Services

Storytimes Music & Movement Storytime, Thursdays 10:15am Baby and Toddler Storytime, Fridays 10:15am Family Storytime, Saturdays 10:15am

Book Clubs Mystery Book Club, 2nd Thursday, 2:00pm Diversity Book Club, 3rd Thursday, 2:00pm

Teen Programs Cosplay Club, 2nd Tuesday, 5:00pm D&D Club, 4th Tuesday, 5:00pm

Tween Programs Craft Club, 4th Wednesday, 4:00pm Beginning Crochet, 2nd & 4th Fridays, 4:00pm

Adult Programs Stitch Club, Tuesdays, 11:00am Tech One-on-One, Fridays, 3:00pm & 3:30pm Game & Chat, 1st Tuesday, 3:00pm Chair Yoga, 2nd & 4th Wednesdays, 11:15am

Tony Hillerman

Tony hillerman tribute.

Hillerman Stitch Club

Join one of our book clubs. Click here for more information.

Cosplay Club

Join us for planning, talking, and working on our own cosplay costumes. All levels welcome. For Ages 15-22.

Programs & Events

Printable calendar, printable events calendar.

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