![]() ![]() This gave me an interesting constraint and more narrative possibilities than if I had done research and come up those details myself. These conversations led to her agreeing to create the entire lifecycle and details of the imaginary hummingbird and salamander for the novel. Brown and I began to talk about the confluence of fiction and nonfiction. With the catalyst of an introduction from professor and writer Melanie Conroy-Goldman-whose kindness during our HWS trip also influenced the novel-Dr. Meghan Brown invited us on a night-time trip aboard the HWS research vessel on Seneca Lake, with students doing research on invasive species. But one especially magical moment occurred when biologist Dr. There were so many ways in which my wife Ann and I found it life-changing. This photo I took in a frazzled moment kind of summed up the confusion and kinetic energy I wanted for Jane’s journey.īut, also, to go back in time a bit…another formative part of Hummingbird Salamander (and a more orderly, rational one) came from spending a semester as the Trias Writer-in-Residence in 2016-2017, at Hobart and William Smith Colleges. It was freezing and when I got to my room, exhausted from a ten-hour drive, I found a space heater glued into the wall, in a way that I’m fairly sure was not up to code. One night I wound up in a very suspect motel. There were long and harrowing segments, while staying in sometimes unusual and eccentric motels-which I stayed in to mimic Jane’s caution in basically staying in out-of-the-way places. It was cold and lonely at times, in a way that I was drawn to. I hugged the coast in desolate places on the drive from Seattle down to San Francisco. So, I kind of method-acted my way down the coast, trying to see the world through Jane’s fractured and paranoid point of view-that I was being tailed, that I had to be aware of people around me at all times. She thinks she’s being pursued by Hellmouth, who I mentioned in my intro, given what she’s found out about Silvina. Jane’s journey down the West Coast is often fraught and paranoid and isolating. But, for me, it’s also been a fascinating journey both literally and figuratively-which these images demonstrate. ![]() What the reader hopefully finds in the novel is a compelling and fast-paced eco-thriller with elements of a psychological thriller with conspiracy elements as well. The process of writing Hummingbird Salamander has blurred and reconfigured the lines between fiction and nonfiction, inspiration versus collaboration, in what I think are interesting ways. At stake in this exploration of eco-mystery may be the fate of the world. As the mystery deepens and Jane’s investigation gets her into trouble, we come to learn more about the antagonists: the wildlife trafficker Langer, Silvina’s father, a wealthy industrialist, and “Hellmouth,” an agent of chaos who both helps and harries Jane at every turn. My new novel Hummingbird Salamander is written from the point of view of Jane, a security analyst who has been gifted with a taxidermied (extinct) hummingbird by a dead eco-activist named Silvina-a woman she does not know. ![]()
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