So I’m reading the New York Times, back on December 29, 2014, when I come across the front-page headline reading, “Where Oil, Corruption and Bodies Surface.” Turns out the article was about the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation in North Dakota. Being a thriller writer, though, I asked myself what if it were an Indian reservation in Texas? And what if it turns out not to be oil at the root of the evil at all, but something else?
At that point, I had no idea what that “something” was. I had a vague notion that one party would be after the secret for its potentially miraculous medicinal qualities, while somebody else would be after it for its potential as a weapon of mass destruction. And for the bad guys, how about ISIS coming to Texas to be taken on by Caitlin Strong and company?
Maybe a third into the book, I still didn’t know what had actually been discovered on my fictional Texas Indian reservation. (The Comanche reservation depicted in this book exists only in my imagination.) Then my brilliant agent, Natalia Aponte, mentioned this substance called cuitlacoche, a corn fungus that’s been turned into a kind of delicacy by Native Americans as well as ancient Indian tribes going all the way back to the Aztecs. In that moment, boom! I knew I had my book, grounded in just enough reality to make it credible, especially after my research confirmed the existence of so-called aroma bombs.
I took my share of technological liberties here, as I did with John D. Rockefeller. I believe I’ve portrayed him accurately and also credibly, except for the fact that his early years of oil exploration in building Standard Oil didn’t include Texas. But, as I’ve quoted before from the brilliant film The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence, “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” And incorporating actual personalities into the historical subplots my Caitlin Strong books are known for is, well, a blast. Just a whole lot of fun.
And that’s what these books are supposed to be—a whole lot of fun. Both for me to write and you to read. If this is your first visit to the world of Caitlin Strong, the good news is you’ve got some catching up to do. Either way, rest assured that Caitlin will be back, around the same time next year, in Strong to the Bone (tentative title). Just don’t ask me what it’s about yet, because I have no idea, other than to say we’re both going to have a whole lot of fun with it again. A sacred promise from writer to reader.
So be well until then, and keep reading!
Providence, Rhode Island; January 6, 2016.