Dean King Bestselling Author, Immersive Journalist, Environmentalist

Thank you for sharing your experiences in Africa and your experiences developing Skeletons on the Zahara with our students. They loved you! We had a long conversation yesterday about your presentation, and hands down, you were their favorite speaker—ever. For this I am very grateful.

—D. S. Freeman High School Center for Leadership, Government, and Global Economics

You have that rare gift of being an exceptional writer and a compelling public speaker.”

—Virginia Historical Society

We finally finished reviewing all the evaluations—your Sunday program got exceptionally outstanding reviews. That is also great because Sunday, usually people are tired!”

—Virginia Festival of the Book, Virginia Foundation for the Humanities

It was a pleasure meeting and working with you. I do hope that you will keep us posted on your future projects; we’ve already decided that you are at the top of the list of speakers we want to invite back.”

—Mariners’ Museum

I would like to express our gratitude for your presentation at our recent Army and Navy Club Trafalgar Dinner…I received lots of positive feedback from the attendees, many noting how much they enjoyed interacting with such a dynamic speaker.”

—United States Marine Corp.

Your talk and the video last evening was one of the best programs we’ve had since I’ve been in the Omnibus Club. I can’t tell you how much we all enjoyed it. Several of the guys suggested that Nolley and I had set a new standard for the speakers.”

—Omnibus Club

King…has done brilliant work bringing the march to life with a plethora of vivid, well-researched details…experiences will linger long after the historical details slip from readers’ memories.”

— Richmond Times Dispatch

“Popular history the way it ought to be written.”

— The Wall Street Journal 

King has an unusual talent for evoking the past – its essence as well as the smells, sights and sounds – while still managing to view it in the light of what we have come to know in the many decades since.”

— San Francisco Chronicle

Just when I thought we had heard all we could read and hear about the miraculous John Muir, this wonderful book on Muir’s lifelong battle to save wild lands came into my hands. Deeply thoughtful, precisely researched, it is testimony to our ongoing obligation to protect the natural world. Muir is our inspiration and teacher.”

— Gretel Ehrlich

King’s diligent research yields pleasing details…”

— The New Yorker

A compelling…a timely example in our own troubled age.”

— Sunday Times

A palpable lesson in ethnography and geography and a delicate study in psychology”

— L.A. Times 

An adventurous classic!”

— Globe and Mail

Dean King, an elegant and adventurous writer, has dug through the encrusted layers of lurid lore and banjo-plucking atmospherics to understand the rich context behind this tragic and fascinating clash of families. The result is a fully-realized work of American history that spans state lines and generations – and resonates powerfully today.”

— Hampton Sides

A terrific feminist story and a significant document of this incredible human feat.”

— Kirkus

Telling the story of world-changing events from the perspective of poor and forgotten women, Dean King offers us a rare and profound kind of history.”

— Ed Ayers