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Highland Park Literary Festival announces Hampton Sides as its 2020 Keynote Speaker

Acclaimed narrative historian Hampton Sides is best known for his gripping, deeply researched adventure stories set in war or depicting epic expeditions of exploration. He's the author of the bestselling histories Ghost Soldiers, Blood and Thunder, Hellhound on His Trail, and In the Kingdom of Ice. His most recent book, On Desperate Ground: The Epic Story of the Chosin Reservoir, the Korean War's Greatest Battle, was named a Best Book of the Year by The Washington Post.

An editor-at-large at Outside magazine and a contributor to such publications as National GeographicThe American Scholar, The New York Times, and The New Yorker, his journalistic works have been frequently anthologized and have twice been named finalists at the National Magazine Awards.

A native of Memphis and a graduate of Yale, Sides was a recent fellow at the Santa Fe Institute and is a member of the Society of American Historians. He is also a partner of Atalaya Productions, an independent film company that develops historical stories for the screen. Hampton lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and teaches narrative non-fiction at Colorado College.

The event will be moderated by Ben Montgomery. Montgomery is the best-selling author of three non-fiction books: Grandma Gatewood's Walk, The Leper Spy, and The Man Who Walked Backwards. Montgomery was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2010.

The HP Literary Festival is made possible by the generous donations from La Fiesta de las Seis Banderas, HP Arts, HPHS PTA, PC Tag, and HPISD families.

Sides will speak to the public at 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 20 at Highland Park High School. The event is organized by HP Literary Festival and is free and open to the public.