Thorpe Moeckel is the author of three previous books of poems, including Venison (Etruscan Press, 2010), Making a Map of the River (Iris Press, 2005), and Odd Botany (Silverfish Review Press, 2002). He has received numerous awards, including the 2014 Nonfiction Promise Award from the Sustainable Arts Foundation, the 2011 Poetry Fellow Award from the National Endowment for the Arts, and the 2004 New Writing Award from the Fellowship of Southern Writers. His poetry has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize (2000, 2002, and 2004). Moeckel currently serves as director of the Jackson Center for Creative Writing at Hollins University. For ten years, Thorpe and his family worked a small farm near the Upper James River in Western Virginia.