Welcome to Windbreak House.
Celebrating 22 Years of Writing Retreats! (founded 1996)
In the center of the nation, deep in the grasslands of western South Dakota, essayist and poet Linda M. Hasselstrom grew up as an only child on a family cattle ranch homesteaded by a Swedish cobbler in 1899.
Today she invites you to benefit from a writing retreat on that same ranch. Come to the house where she discovered the Great Plains outside her windows, where she began to write the poetry and non-fiction books that have established her as one of the strongest voices on behalf of the prairie.
Linda holds a BA in English and Journalism, an MA in American Literature, and has been a teacher of writing for more than 45 years. She has hosted writing retreats at her ranch since 1996.
Not a writer but a reader? Enjoy Linda's vivid descriptions of her life and work on the ranch, as a writer, and as an advocate for the preservation of the prairies and the people and wildlife who inhabit them.
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Meet Linda on Youtube
For a brief introduction to Linda, her ranching life, her books, and the writing retreats, watch this
Two-Minute Summary on Youtube. You've read her words-- now hear her voice and see her ranch and writing retreat.
The News from Windbreak House -- July, 2018
Book Award!
In April, 2018,
Story Circle Network announced that
Gathering from the Grassland, published by
High Plains Press, won the 2017 Sarton Women's Book Award (in the memoir category). Story Circle Network sent me gold foil stickers to place on the book covers to denote the award.
The award program is named in honor of May Sarton, who is remembered for her contributions to women's literature as a memoirist, novelist, and poet. Awards are given annually to women authors writing chiefly about women in memoir, biography, and fiction published in the United States and Canada and selected from works submitted. Sarton award winners are published by small/independent publishers, university presses, and author-publishers.
Read about my memberships, awards, and honors
on this page of the website.
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New Books
I had two new books published late in 2017.
Gathering from the Grassland: A Plains Journal
My first book,
Windbreak: A Woman Rancher on the Northern Plains, written in journal form, covered a year on my family's ranch, telling the stories of the land, the livestock and wildlife, and the people.
My newest book, also in journal form, revisits that same landscape thirty years later. I spent a year observing the changing of the seasons and the daily life of my feathered and furred neighbors. At the same time I studied the personal journals of my parents and other relatives, trying to understand their lives from an older-- and wiser-- perspective; hoping that making sense of the past will allow me to see my way into the future.
Click here to read the "All About the Book" webpage for
Gathering from the Grassland.
Gathering from the Grassland: A Plains Journal --- High Plains Press, 2017
(320 pages; size 6 x 9)
$19.95 -- paperback
$29.95 -- hardcover
You may purchase a signed copy from me for the cover price plus $4 shipping
Linda M. Hasselstrom
PO Box 169
Hermosa, South Dakota 57744
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Dakota: Bones, Grass, Sky --- Collected and New Poems
The original edition of
Dakota Bones: The Collected Poems of Linda Hasselstrom was published by Spoon River Poetry Press in 1993. This new and expanded edition contains all of the original poems plus 50 new poems-- an accumulation of poems from many years. In 2011 I published 50 new poems in
Dirt Songs: A Plains Duet with Twyla M. Hansen, now Nebraska’s Poet Laureate. Some of these poems predate those; some were published in periodicals but have not previously appeared in book form.
Click here to read the "All About the Book" webpage for
Dakota: Bones, Grass, Sky.
Dakota: Bones, Grass, Sky – Collected and New Poems --- Spoon River Poetry Press, 2017
(240 pages; size 5.5 x 8.5)
$14.95 -- paperback
You may purchase a signed copy from me for $14.95 plus $4 shipping
Linda M. Hasselstrom
PO Box 169
Hermosa, South Dakota 57744
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Now, What About Your Writing?
Windbreak House Writing Retreats and Online Writing Conversations by eMail.
If you would like to spend some time writing at Windbreak House see the
Writing Retreats Page for the list of available retreat dates in 2018 and all the details you need to know about applying for a writing retreat (working with me) or a solitary retreat (recharge your creativity and enjoy uninterrupted writing time).
If you can't take a retreat holiday because your time or your budget is tight, we can still have some productive writing fun together online. See the
Online Writing Help Page for complete details on how to sign up for a Writing Conversation by eMail.
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Stories About Writing Retreats
Susan wrote a blog about her January, 2016 writing retreat-- you'll get a few writing tips while you enjoy reading about her experience.
www.writingwyoming.com/2016/02/lessons-from-writing-retreat
And I have a blog series about writing retreats.
Six Steps to a Successful Retreat at Windbreak House
Create Your Own Writing Retreat at Home
"Windbreak House Writing Retreats 20th Anniversary" series -- posted in December 2016 and January 2017
2016 was the 20th year I conducted writing retreats at my ranch home. Read this ongoing series of blogs for stories, photos, and many quotes by writers taken from the Retreat House journals. I have written 8 chapters and expect to write a few more later this year.
Part 1 -- Beginnings
Part 2 -- Evolution
Part 3 -- Guidelines
Part 4 -- The People
Part 5 -- The Writing
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My WordPress blog "Notes from a Western Life."
Come on over and sign up for a subscription.
New Blog Posts
Notes from a Western Life -- The Windbreak House Blog
My WordPress blog allows me to include multiple photos, link with social media across the web, and offer you a free subscription that sends a dandy version of the blog directly to your email inbox, photos and all. To subscribe click on any of these links to go to the blog, then scroll down and look for the subscription box in the right-hand column.
Some Recent Blogs:
"Persistence is Perpetual" -- posted March 21st, 2018
In this essay, I consider the fact that good writing is mostly the result of steady work: persistence in the business of writing. I provide an example of my own persistence in a poem that I began in 1971 and finished in 2011, by reprinting a chapter from my book
The Wheel of the Year: A Writer’s Workbook (2015, Red Dashboard Publishing).
Read the story about the poem.
"Peterman Inspires More Than Sales" -- posted March 16, 2018
What is the secret of the J. Peterman clothing catalog? Stories: the very backbone of most fiction and nonfiction writing, as well as of much excellent poetry.
Find some writing inspiration here.
"Lucknow: The Topic is Not Guns" -- posted March 1st, 2018
A passing reference to loading guns at Lucknow, in the PBS series Downton Abbey, led me to this story from history.
Learn about fortitude here.
"Plowprint Report: Only half of the Great Plains grasslands remains intact" -- posted February 23rd, 2018
The World Wildlife Fund’s 2017 Plowprint Report, a survey of what’s happening to grasslands in the world, does not hold good news.
Learn what you can do to help preserve this critical habitat.
"A Steamy Experience" -- posted February 6th, 2018
Evans Plunge in Hot Springs, SD, has offered year-round warm mineral waters for swimming since 1890. In this blog I share some of its history, offer photos (from various online sources), and describe the joys of visiting the Plunge on a cold winter day. Ahhhh.
Enjoy the Hot Springs with me.
"The Skunk Minuet" -- posted January 20th, 2018
Skunks are always around on the prairie, eating a diet of insects, worms rodents, lizards, frogs, snakes, birds, eggs, berries, roots, leaves and grasses without disturbing us. Then comes the night they discover the compost bin.
Meet our resident skunk here.
Because it is time-consuming to update two blogs, I have phased out the blog on this website to concentrate on my WordPress site. However, many older blogs are still available on the Blog Page of this website which you will find by
clicking here.
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Interview on KEVN TV
In March, 2017, I was interviewed by Taylar Perez of Rapid City's KEVN Black Hills Fox TV station. Taylar came to Windbreak House, filmed my responses to her thoughtful questions, and captured shots of the Writing Retreat house, the books I spoke about, and early spring at the ranch. Then she zoomed back to Rapid City, filmed another interview elsewhere, edited the stories in the afternoon, and presented them that evening while she also anchored the news. Wow!
You can watch my interview and read the transcript here
at KEVN Black Hills Fox.
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YouTube Videos
In honor of National Poetry Month, and specifically
National Cowboy Poetry Week (April 16-22, 2017), I recorded some stories and readings as a tribute to Badger Clark, South Dakota's first Poet Laureate.
I was inspired by a number of writers and poets during my childhood-- notably Mari Sandoz and Badger Clark-- who each wrote about the west that I recognized from my life on the ranch.
Video posted 2017 --- See my tribute to Badger Clark, his cabin in nearby Custer State Park, and his humorous Last Verse of poetry
here on Youtube.
See also my video about Badger Clark's poem "The Legend of Boastful Bill"
here on Youtube (published 2016).
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