Great Lakes policy advocate Dave Dempsey, an important Michigan environmental writer, has a new book out, a first novel called "Superior Shores: A Novel of Conservation."
It's also a novel approach for Dempsey, who has helped shape Great Lakes policy for 26 years and has written four environmental history books and a biography on Gov. William Milliken. He works now as communications director for Conservation Minnesota, a Minneapolis nonprofit that adopted a "storytelling approach" to engage people in environmental issues.
I wanted to read the book for three reasons. Dempsey's first book, "Ruin & Recovery: Michigan's Rise as a Conservation Leader" is my favorite history of Michigan.
I was intrigued by the title's "Novel of Conservation" tag. It reminded me of Traverse City's Harold Titus, an early conservationist and popular adventure writer who wrote "Timber," a 1922 novel credited with helping the public understand the danger of Michigan's timber wastelands and the importance of reforestation.
I was curious, too, on why Dempsey made the writing leap to novelist. "Superior Shores: A Novel of Conservation," self-published this year, is an interesting read from that standpoint.
The story takes place in 2001 in a mythical Upper Peninsula town called Copper River right after Sept. 11, 2001. Kevin Murphy, a slick Chicago regulatory law attorney jumps ship to pursue his dream of developing a 70-unit vacation lodge and condo complex on a ridge of undeveloped forest along the Keweenaw Peninsula on Lake Superior. This puts him at cross-purposes with local conservationists, led by Linda McBride, who wants the village to buy and preserve the property.
I shot off some questions to Dempsey. Here's our Q & A:
Q. Was it difficult to make the switch from environmental history and policy writing to fiction?
A. Easier than you'd expect. I started out as an (unpublished) fiction writer and actually have a few more in the can. People who are unlikely to pick up a tome on environmental policy or history may be more excited about a novel that dramatizes the battle over saving a place. Now, whether I succeeded in storytelling is a whole 'nother matter.
Q. Tell me more about the "storytelling approach" of engaging people in environmental issues.
A. We believe (with reason, I think) that most people don't care about and can't follow the ins and outs of policymaking. Jargon and wheeling and dealing in the Capitol puts people off. We all connect with these issues through personal experiences. So, we have asked dozens of people to give us stories about their outdoor experiences and only then to link what they experience to a choice that public officials must make.
Q. How much of your novel is based in your own experiences, and what environmental issues have you've worked on?
A. I'd say my experiences informed the book, but it's not based on any event in particular. It does play out like some issues I've been involved in, a long and sadly mostly unresolved list — toxic waste, toxic chemicals in products, air quality, water cleanup, groundwater pollution prevention, parks management and creation, wilderness protection, fish and game habitat protection, invasive species.
Q: Did you have some politicians in mind while writing "Superior Shores."
A. Not a particular politician, but the politician featured in the story is certainly a composite of many I've observed and collided with — bellicose, self-righteous and comical, if you have a sense of humor about these things.
Q. I am interested in the phrase "a novel of conservation." Isn't that what someone called Harold Titus' book, "Timber"?
A. I'm an admirer of what Harold Titus did as both a novelist and a leading Michigan conservationist. I guess in a small way I'm hoping this novel puts me in his footprints. The subtitle, though, is simply a way of conveying that this is more than an enviromance — see, I have founded a new book genre.
Q. How did you find time to write a novel?
A. I made the time, roughly an hour a day, usually the evening. I had to make the time. The sands of my career hourglass are running a little low, and seeing how little progress we've made on so many of these issues, I decided to go for the heart as much as the head. The head — if the political process can be compared to one — is muddled and unable to help us find a way out of our conservation problems.
Q. Are there more works of fiction coming?
A. I hope so. I'm starting a new one on an environmental story called "Slow-Motion Murder." Stay tuned.
Horizon Books, 243 E. Front St. downtown, will host a book-signing for Dave Dempsey from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Aug. 8.
