Many people are familiar with the name Nick Jans. For more than 25 years he’s written about his experiences in various parts of the state for Alaska Magazine. From those essays and other experiences, he’s published 12 books. A recent work A Wolf Called Romeo captured a slot on the New York Times Best Seller list. A long time back, I  interviewed Jans when he came out with his first book, The Last Light Breaking. It described and celebrated his life in the village of Ambler in the Northwest Arctic Borough. His latest book also reflects on the region, but with a different sensibility, as you will hear when he opens the program reading an excerpt from The Giant’s Hand

Also on the show, I debriefed Ned Rozell about his hike along the Trans-Alaska Pipeline corridor… again. Ned is a science writer at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute and the author of Walking My Dog Jane, the story of his first hike along the 800-mile pipeline 20 years ago.

And katexic clippings’ Chris Lott follows the scent to the etymological roots of the word “wolf.”