BOOKSHELF

BOOKSHELF BY BUDGE RUFFNER

BLUE DESERT, by Charles Bowden. University of Arizona Press, 1615 East Speedway, Tucson, AZ 85719. 1986. 175 pages. $16.95 hardcover, plus $1 postage.

Charles Bowden writes about the desert as hundreds of others think they can or wish they could. His views are broader and his insights deeper; his prose is as lean and colorful as a coral snake, and as difficult to ignore.

Much of Blue Desert focuses on the sad and seamy side of the Southwest. It is doubtful this will be required chamber of commerce reading. Where pseudo-Spanish retirement neighborhoods surround golf courses, there are also grisly murders. In a land of swimming pools and spectacular sunsets, half the marriages end in divorce. On a small ranch where family graves have sunk and been leveled after countless summer rains, developers tempt the old Mexican-American owners, offering a new life lived in aluminum.

In this land of little rain, children drown in backyard Ever since the white man first came here more than four centuries ago, the Southwest deserts have left on him a lasting impression. Beauty, mystery, and danger were the messages. With his art and literature, he reproduced the beauty; with science, he explained the mysteries; and with common sense, he avoided the dangers. Today, that fascination with the desert is still ardent and nearuniversal. Within the last few years, numerous books have been published dealing specifically with desert regions. Saguaro is about one of the most spectacular portions of the Sonoran Desert.

Gary Paul Nabhan, the assistant director of the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix and the recipient of the 1986 Burroughs Medal swimming pools. Where illegal immigrants die of thirst, the government spends millions to bring in new water while developers pour potable water into artificial lakes to sell houses.

It is a land of contradictions. Bowden's writing takes the reader toand into the scene. On his desert, you are parched; in a cheap bar, you smell the second - hand smoke; where a murder has occurred, you recognize the sticky smell of blood. This is a Sun Belt most of us have seldom sampled.

Charles Bowden knows the Sun Belt and frets about its future like the mother of a disadvantaged child. Every day, people come to the sunny Southwest from cities of soot and misfortune, then try to re-create what they left behind. Bowden wants his desert left alone. At times he sounds like an old man complaining about tomatoes' not tasting as they used to. Blue Desert has style, variety, and perception. The author, editor of Tucson's City Magazine, has a future.

for nature writing, is a rare combination of scientist and poet. The design and quality of this book are worthy of the author and his text. This is the day of the desert book, and Saguaro, like its namesake, dominates the scene.

ARIZONA HIDEAWAYS, by Thelma Heatwole. Golden West Publishers, 4113 North Longview, Phoenix, AZ 85014. 1986. 128 pages. $5.50 softcover, postpaid.

Thelma Heatwole is as much a part of Arizona as the roadrunner, and has been to places in the state that bird has never seen. In this, her third book about Arizona, she focuses on some of the lesser-known towns and hamlets of the state. Thirty-eight such communities are included in the book. In each case, the author gives a bit of village history, lists local attractions, and offers a nonhostile appraisal of bed and board. Ninety of her photographs are included, along with a map of each section Of the state and an index. Arizona Hideaways is a good guide to the outback by a lady who knows the territory.

(RIGHT) The Phoenix Art Museum currently displays this model of James Turrell's Roden Crater Project. The crater is a natural feature located about fifty miles northeast of Flagstaff. It is being reshaped to a precise conformation and its interior penetrated by construction of tunnels and portals to enable visi tors to observe such phenomena as the subtle celestial changes occurring daily at sunset. Turrell was inspired by ancient sites in Mexico and Egypt. The crater project is scheduled for completion in 1992. The model is on loan from Robert Mangurian, Venice, California. DAN VERMILLION (BACK COVER) One of the most dramatic examples of an abrupt change in biological life zones is observed along Interstate 17 south of Sunset Point. See article beginning on page 4. PETER SCHWEPKER