BY KAREN BOSSICK

Hailey author and photographer Julie Weston and Gerry Morrison will discuss their new book, “Magical Universe of the Ancients: A Desert Journal,” by Zoom tonight.

The Zoom talk, hosted by the Hailey Public Library, will take place at 5:30 p.m. tonight—Thursday, Oct. 15. To take part, email Kristin.fletcher@haileypubliclibrary.org.

Weston, author of three Nellie Burns mystery books set in the Sun Valley area, and Morrison have spent years upon years making the sojourn to red rock country. Their coffee table book takes readers to areas not easily accessed by the general public.

“The desert Southwest is truly a magical universe of geology, ancient human history and incredible beauty,” said programming coordinator Kristin Fletcher. “Julie and Gerry traveled by car, on foot and with llamas to record the sights, sounds and scents of the ancient and natural worlds of the Southwest.”

Weston, who also wrote a memoir of place about the Idaho mining town in which she grew up, has won several awards for her writing, including Honorable Mention in the 2009 Idaho Book of the Year contest, the 2017 WILLA Literary Award for Historical Fiction, the 2019 Idaho Writers Conference Non-Fiction Memoir Competition and the 2019 Bronze Foreword INDIES Award for Mystery.

Morrison shoots with a large format Linhof Technica 4x5, a Hasselblad 2-1/4, a Leicaflex R6, a Nikon ditigal camera and—most recently—his smart phone. His photographs have been published on book covers and in magazines.