Scores of writers have brought New Hampshire's landscape to life on the page, in novels from "Peyton Place" to the "World According to Garp" and "The Weight of Water." Now the New Hampshire Writers' Project is paying homage to that heritage with a series of literary tours. The New Hampshire Writers' Trail will consist of a series of programs that are site-specific to areas in New Hampshire that have strong connections to either an author or a specific literary work or series of works.

The Writers' Trail debuts on June 25 in Laconia with Ruth Doan MacDougall, author of the cult-classic "The Cheerleader" (1973), leading a bus tour of the houses, ice cream shops, arcades, schools, and other sites in the Laconia area that inspired the book. A lunch and authorbook-signing will follow. In the afternoon, MacDougall and Dartmouth College writing instructor Ernest Hebert will lead a workshop on "Using Place as Inspiration." Hebert is a native of Keene; as a writer he's best known for nailing the New Hampshire cultural landscape, particularly as re-created in his fictional town of Darby-right down to the washing machines in Howard Elman's front yard. "Spoonwood," the sixth Darby novel and the first in 15 years, will be published by the University Press of New England this fall.

Subsequent programs in other areas of the state that have a strong literary heritage will include the Monadnock Region and the Dartmouth/Lake Sunapee Region. Call the New Hampshire Writers' Project at 603-314-7980 or visit www.nhwritersproject.org for more information.