Timothy Egan, author of the National Book Award winner, The Worst Hard Times: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl, will discuss that human and environmental catastrophe in a free, public lecture at Bellevue Community College on April 23.

Eagan’s book is this year’s selection for BCC Reads!, a program that promotes creativity and interdisciplinary learning at the college by selecting one book to be a focus of as many classes, lectures and performances as possible across the campus each year.

The free, public event begins at 5:30 p.m. with a reception for the author and the college’s BCC Reads! Scholarship Winners – students who have paralleled Egan’s study by doing their own research on the impact of environmental disasters on culture, society and the natural world.

Egan’s lecture begins at 7 p.m. in BCC’s Carlson Theatre, to be followed by a book-signing in the theatre lobby.

Called “a flat-out masterpiece of historical reportage” by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, The Worst Hard Time captures the heroism and terror of the decade-long Dust Bowl disaster, a time when the simplest thing in life – breathing – was a hazard. The book documents the power of human perseverance in the face of wretched conditions and serves as a cautionary tale about the dangers of trifling with nature.

A Pulitzer Prize-winning national enterprise reporter for the New York Times, Egan is a resident of Seattle.

Other books by Egan include The Good Rain (a Pacific Northwest Booksellers Book Award winner and regional bestseller for over a decade) and Lasso the Wind.