In Feathered Forest, award-winning nature writer Marina Richie entwines the lives of birds with a hidden vertical world of wild trees. A narrative of perception change, memoir, and kinship, Feathered Forest is a soaring ode to birds and wild trees.

Beginning with an ascent of a 200-foot-tall Douglas-fir with a bird biologist, author Marina Richie leads us from her home in Central Oregon into the ancient forests of Cascadia, a bioregion which rivals the Amazonian rainforest in significance for climate and biodiversity. Birds are guides to intricate and imperiled communities thriving at every level, from understory to midstory to overstory. They steer us to cool havens within multilayered, centuries-old groves that are critical refugia in a time of climate crisis. Their songs and flights show us what we must protect for the future of threatened birds, forests, and humankind.

Marina’s reading will weave in relevant sections for the Sisters audience, from ancient forests lining the Metolius River to the oldest western juniper. She will highlight individuals from Central Oregon making a difference for birds and forests, and offer tangible conservation actions.

Marina Richie is an award-winning nature writer with a passion for birds and wild places. Her book Halcyon Journey: In Search of the Belted Kingfisher received the 2024 John Burroughs Medal for distinguished natural history writing, a 2022 National Outdoor Book Award (gold), band a Foreword Indies Award (silver). Through prose and poetry, Marina seeks to bridge the divide separating people from nature. Her essays, blogs, and poems appear in popular and literary magazines. Marina has a master’s degree in journalism from the University of Montana and an undergraduate degree in biology from the University of Oregon. She lives in Bend, Oregon, with her husband Wes and tends a bird-friendly yard.