As John and I have been doing events, podcasts, book clubs, and interviews, we get asked a lot about the Tasmanian devils of Devils Island. We heard the devils while on Maria Island (on which the book’s fictional Marbury Island was based), but we didn’t get to meet them until we visited the Bonorong Wildlife …
This interview was conducted and edited by Ashland Creek Press intern Rachel Harris. Q: What inspired you to write this story? A: For five years I worked on a farm where we raised and slaughtered birds for meat. I am fairly comfortable handling living animals and dead animals, but I can’t get myself to kill an …
This interview was conducted and edited by Ashland Creek Press intern Rachel Harris. Q: What inspired you to write this story? A: “Last of the Sasquatch Wilds” was inspired by our previous presidential administration’s (here in the U.S.) push to expand the reach of private corporations to drill for fossil fuels on national parkland while simultaneously …
This interview was conducted and edited by Ashland Creek Press intern Rachel Harris. Q: What inspired you to write this story? A: After I completed my MFA, and I was starting my writing career, I wanted to remain connected with animals and animal life. One of the ways I did that was by volunteering several summers …
This interview was conducted and edited by Ashland Creek Press intern Rachel Harris. Q: What inspired you to write this story? A: The reports of jaguars being poached to make jaguar “gum/paste” for bogus medicinal purposes in Chinese medicine coupled with children being kidnapped by the U.S. government as they came to the border with their …
This interview was conducted and edited by Ashland Creek Press intern Rachel Harris. Q: What inspired you to write this story? A: I was actually listening to the totally fabulous herpetology podcast SquaMates by Mark D. Scherz, Gabriel Ugueto, Hiral Naik, and Ethan Kocak, and in one of their early episodes they mentioned that axolotls can actually metamorphose …
This interview was conducted and edited by Ashland Creek Press intern Rachel Harris. Q: There seems to be a reawakening in society to the middle ages and our relationships with animals then. Was this story based on a true story? What inspired you to tell this story? A: Many years ago, I read John Julius Norwich’s …
This interview was conducted and edited by Ashland Creek Press intern Rachel Harris. Q: What inspired you to write this story? A: I’m a volunteer with NorCal Collie Rescue, and back in the summer of 2014, I got a call about two collies found in an isolated area of Plumas National Forest. They were wild, emaciated, …