Harvesting History

Please join Muriel Murch in conversation with Christine Walker at Clio's on Wednesday, March 12th to celebrate the release of Muriel's memoir, Harvesting History. Doors at 6:30; conversation begins promptly at 7pm.

Harvesting History blends the themes of family, farming, and filmmaking. The narrative follows Murch’s journey from Los Angeles to West Marin, where she and her husband, filmmaker Walter Murch, settle on a farm in Northern California and the unique community of Bolinas.

Here their life intertwines with a changing community, organic farming, and the Bay Area’s burgeoning independent film scene.The book captures Murch’s reflections on the land, describing her connection to farming practices, organic produce, and the natural beauty of California’s rural landscape, interwoven with portraits of old timers, the emerging young community, and family. It includes interactions with key figures from the independent film movement, including George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola, close friends and collaborators of Walter’s.

Murch’s narrative emphasizes the cycles of nature, community resilience, and a simpler, sustainable way of life, contrasting it with the fast pace of Hollywood and urban development. The book is a tribute to both the land and the bonds formed through shared values of preservation and creativity, celebrating the enduring spirit of a close-knit community that grew alongside the land they cultivated. Richly textured with vivid descriptions of rural life, personal growth, and artistic pursuit, Harvesting History offers readers a poetic glimpse into the joys and challenges of living in harmony with nature and creativity.

Muriel Aggie Murch is the author of Journey in the Middle of the Road One Woman’s Path through a Midlife Education and The Bell Lap Stories for Compassionate Nursing Care. She lives with her husband in Northern California and London.

Christine Walker, MFA, MA, is a visual artist and author of the new novel Tap Dancing at the Bluebird, an epic story of love and friendship celebrating dance and second chances across a century of cultural change in America. She is also the author and artist of A Painter's Garden: Cultivating the Creative Life, a memoir about creative process accompanied by her paintings of the garden. Her interdisciplinary career includes exhibiting in galleries and public collections, strategic visioning facilitation, graphic and dance stage design, songwriting, and teaching the craft of writing fiction and memoir.

Host or Publisher Clio's Books