Join us for a discussion with Bryan Mealer and Joshua Wheeler, the authors of new books about hardscrabble times, places, and people in Texas and New Mexico. Mealer's "The Kings of Big Spring," which has been called the Texas version of Hillbilly Elegy, is a saga of God, family, and oil across many generations of the authors own family. Wheeler's "Acid West," a collection of essays about Southern New Mexico, has been called a freaky, stylish, heart-cracking-open book. The evening's discussion is moderated by Gustavo Arellano of the Los Angeles Times. Brought to you by The Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West, The Huntington Library Research Division, and The Journal of Alta California (AltaOnline.com). A reception and booksigning follows the program. ----- BRYAN MEALER is the author of "Muck City" and the New York Times bestseller "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind" written with William Kamkwamba which has been translated into more than a dozen languages and is the basis of a major motion picture. Hes also the author of "All Things Must Fight to Live," which chronicled his time covering the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo for the Associated Press and Harper's. His other work has appeared in Texas Monthly, Esquire, the Guardian, and the New York Times. Mealer and his family live in Austin. "The Kings of Big Spring": https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250058911 JOSHUA WHEELER is from Alamogordo, New Mexico. His essays have appeared in many literary journals, including The Iowa Review, Sonora Review, PANK, and the Missouri Review. He has written feature stories for BuzzFeed and Harper's Magazine online and is a coeditor of the anthology "We Might as Well Call It the Lyric Essay." He is a graduate of the University of Southern California, and New Mexico State University, and has an MFA in nonfiction writing from the University of Iowa. He teaches creative writing at Louisiana State University. "Acid West": https://www.fsgoriginals.com/books/acid-west GUSTAVO ARELLANO is a longtime chronicler of California and the Southwest, and currently is a features writers for the Los Angeles Times. He has traveled through the Panhandle and New Mexico every summer for the past decade.