Author shares how to score scholarships

Ben Kaplan, the author of “How to Go to College Almost for Free,” will give scholarship workshops in Santa Fe and in Albuquerque this week. The workshops, which are free, are at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 18, at Capital High School, 4851 Paseo del Sol, Santa Fe, and at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 19, at Sandia High School, 7801 Candelaria NE.

Following the hourlong workshops, Kaplan will answer questions. Because space is limited, advance online registration is required. Go to events.benkaplan.com/newmexico.

Kaplan said that the workshops are not only for high school seniors planning to enter college next fall, but also for students who are now in college and for adults planning to return to college.

Kaplan, who grew up in Eugene, Ore., said he won two dozen scholarships that got him into Harvard and, combined with free tuition credits, they covered his entire cost of attending the prestigious Ivy League university.

IN PLACITAS: Poets John Brandi and Renee Gregorio of El Rito are the featured readers at 3 today at the Anasazi Fields Winery in Placitas. The reading is part of the Duende Poetry Series, now in its eighth year.

Brandi, a recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Poetry, has written several poetry collections and the story collection “Reflections in the Lizard’s Eye.”

Gregorio, a co-founder of Tres Chicas Books, won the New Mexico Book Award for Poetry for “Love and Death: Greatest Hits.”

To reach the winery, take the Placitas exit of Interstate 25, head east six miles to Camino de los Pueblitos, go north to the winery. Admission is free but donations for the poets are encouraged.

AT BOOKWORKS: Anya Achtenberg reads from and discusses her debut novel, “Blue Earth,” at 3 p.m. today at the bookstore, 4022 Rio Grande NW. The book is set in Minnesota where Carver Heinz loses his farm, and his family, in the farm crisis of the 1980s. As a result, Heinz is a displaced person in urban Minneapolis. The story presents his encounters with a child he rescues from a tornado and his friendship with an Indian boy that reveals the characters’ shared histories, especially the 1862 Dakota Conflict.

Achtenberg also is a published poet and has been a creative writing teacher at various schools, including the University of New Mexico and the Taos Summer Writers Conference.

AT THE BOOK STOP: Nicole Blaisdell Ivey and William Peterson will discuss and sign copies of “Gus Blaisdell Collected” from 3-5 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 22, at The Book Stop, 3216 Silver SE. The late Blaisdell was well-known in Albuquerque as writer, teacher, publisher, editor and the proprietor of The Living Batch bookstore.

The book contains Blaisdell’s critical writings, including essays on literature, art and film and tributes by other writers. Ivey is an Albuquerque photographer and writer. Peterson is an instructor in the University of New Mexico’s Department of Art and Art History and is a longtime editor of ARTSPACE magazine.

UNM Press is the publisher.

AT PAGE ONE: The bookstore at 11018 Montgomery NE hosts these two author events this week. … Judy Nickell talks about her new book “Atrisco to Zena Lona: A Snappy Survey of Selected Albuquerque Street Names” at 1 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 22. … At 3 p.m. the same day retired Los Alamos scientist Leandro Thomas Gonzales discusses his new novel “Follow the Spinning Sun.”

SOUTHWEST WRITERS EVENT: Writing coaches Lynn C. Miller and Lisa Lenard-Cook talk about “Find Your Story, Write Your Memoir” from 7-9 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 18 at New Life Presbyterian Church, 5540 Eubank NE. $5 general public.