What's Up - Your guide to what's happening in Fayetteville, AR this week!
Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/1141216
Unlike Kya, as a young girl, I had a loving family and many friends, so I did not experience any of the abandonment or loneliness that Kya did as a child. It was later, when I lived in remote areas of Africa, that I experienced loneliness and the affect that isolation can have on a person. Q. Why North Carolina as a setting instead of somewhere more exotic? A. I chose the marsh of North Carolina for both practical and poetic reasons. On the practical side, I wanted this story of a young girl growing up mostly alone to be believable. The coastal marsh of NC has a very temperate climate, gardens grow well, and food such as oysters and mussels are fairly easy to collect. Survival of a young girl really is possible. As for the poetic reasons, I chose the coastal marsh because it is a place of beautiful light, sparkling waterways, and miles of lush green grasses that flow to the horizons. It is hopeful and joyful compared to a swamp which can be dark and sinister. Most of us end up in a swamp, a low point, sometime during our lives. "Where the Crawdads Sing" is a story about how to move from the darkness back into the light. I also chose the marsh of North Carolina because I knew it fairly well because my family visited North Carolina on our family vacations when I was growing up in Georgia. Q. What was a day in your life like during those years in Africa? And what is a day in your life like where you reside currently? A. I lived in some of the most remote areas of Africa while studying wildlife, so literally had incredible interactions with wildlife every single day for 23 years. For more than seven years, my research partner, Mark Owens, and I were the only two people in an area the size of Ireland except for some roaming Bushmen, who we never saw. The lions would come into our camp every day of the wet season and often ransacked our outside kitchen area, stealing bags of flour from the tree branches, where we hung them. One night a young brown hyena stepped into our reed bath boma and licked water from the bath basin I was standing in. On numerous occasions we immobilized lions, hyenas or elephants to attach radio collars and were often charged by lions and once by a 450-pound elephant calf. No one day passed without some excitement! Since returning from Africa, for more than 20 years, I lived in the remote mountains of Northern Idaho. There have been moose in my woodshed, a cougar in my barn, and bears on my deck. I have ridden my beautiful white mare over hundreds of miles of mountain trails and cross- country skied in the back country right outside my backdoor. Every single day, I realize how fortunate I am to have lived such a life. Q. What propelled you from nonfiction to fiction? A. My 23 years of observing wild animals such as lions, brown hyenas and elephants every day, made me realize how much our behavior is like theirs, and therefore how much of our behavior is genetically based. For example, as primates, humans are Downtown Fayetteville 104 N Block St • 479-442-4031 east Fayetteville 2000 N Crossover Rd • 479-442-4042 fourseasonscleanersnwa.com Dry Cleaning & Laundry Specialty Items Alterations Wedding Gown Preservation Pick-up & Delivery Same Day Service Northwest Arkansas' Premier Dry Cleaning & Laundry Experts Bright colors. Interactive sculptures. An unforgettable summer exhibition. Get your tickets today! AT CRYSTAL BRIDGES S P O N S O R E D AT C RY S TA L B R I D G E S BY Avis Bailey Charles & Shannon Holley Jim Smith & Rebecca Hurst Ken & Celia Shireman 4 WHAT'S UP! JULY 14-20, 2019 FYI Also in Arkansas Books on Tap Book Club — "Where the Crawdads Sing" by Delia Owens, 7 p.m. July 16, Bike Rack Brewing Co. in Springdale. Hosted by Springdale Public Library. Free. 750-8180. If All Arkansas Read the Same Book — 4 p.m. July 21, Ron Robinson Theater in Little Rock at 4 p.m. July 21. 501-320-5715. Owens Continued From Page 3 COVER STORY inclined to live in tightly bonded groups. Those observations in the wild inspired me to write a novel that would explore how much isolation would affect the behavior of a young girl forced to grow up mostly alone without her troop. Q. What's it like to be on the road as a best-selling fiction author, meeting fans and signing books? A. Fabulous!! I never take one moment of this journey for granted. I am so grateful that so many people have embraced my novel, and I love meeting them. I lived a lonely life for many years, but the readers have filled my life with joy and purpose. My 23 years of observing wild animals such as lions, brown hyenas and elephants every day, made me realize how much our behavior is like theirs. — Delia Owens