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A Peek at My Life
When Squirrels Fly follows a skeptical professor who teams up with a travel writer to find her missing aunt, only to uncover wormholes, secret research, and a conspiracy hidden within an eccentric neighborhood. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
I’ve lived in college towns my entire life. Ann Arbor, the setting of my story, is my fourth college town. The eccentric neighborhood is my neighborhood. While I have worked for community-based organizations (the YMCA and parks and recreation) during my time here, I’ve also had the privilege to provide consultation for the University of Michigan’s Institute of Clinical Health Research through a program that focuses on community-based participatory research. I find medical research quite fascinating, and my consultation with MICHR has provided me a unique opportunity to look behind the scenes at the research process. The wormhole allowed me to jump around to my favorite places without really needing a strategic reason to highlight them. My story setup incorporated quite a bit of my personal experience.
Why did you choose Ann Arbor as the setting, and which local details were most important for you to include?
This is my debut novel. I had a lot to learn about the writing and publishing process. I chose Ann Arbor as my setting for a couple of reasons. I’ve lived here for almost 30 years. And during that time, I trained for 15 marathons with all of those training miles within a 10-mile radius of my Ann Arbor house on the old West Side. I have a hard-to-match familiarity with that radius, so I could describe it from memory and needed little research on the setting. This gave me more time to devote to learning about the writing process. Also, I grew up in Indianapolis with six brothers and sisters. I am the only one who moved away. My book gives my family a peek at my life. I made my story a bit whimsical to poke just a little bit of fun at them, as some of my siblings tease that my mind has been corrupted because I live in a college town. I highlighted some of my favorite places to run as well as some of my comfort foods.
How did you develop Allie’s emotional journey from guarded skepticism to greater trust in others and herself?
Allie is at a crossroads in her career at the outset of the story. She’s also still dealing with the heartbreaking loss of some important people from her life. Her adventure in Ann Arbor allows her to reconnect with her brother. Her brother, Nick, is somewhat based upon my own brother whom I lost to suicide in 2017. When my brother died, I realized how little one-on-one time I had spent with him throughout his life. I left home to go to college before he entered high school, and I never returned. I purposely created a brother-sister relationship in my book that would help me feel like I had more time with my brother. Allie’s interaction with her brother reminds her that despite the relationships that they have lost, and even because of those losses, their brother-sister relationship is something they can trust. And her brother helps her to realize that trusting others actually helps us learn to better trust ourselves.
Was Chidi always intended to play such an important role, or did the character become more prominent as you wrote?
Chidi is based upon my dog Cheech. I adopted him from the Humane Society to help me recover from the grief of losing my brother. I had a scare the week before my book’s publication date when my dog Cheech developed Congestive Heart Failure. I had to rush him to the emergency vet in the wee hours of the morning. By some miracle, he survived and is doing well. I think my brother was watching over us. I always intended him to play a pivotal role in the book, just as he has in my life. And Chidi’s behavior was inspired by a conversation I had with neighbors about indoor/outdoor cats. While a cat can wander the neighborhood all day without alarming its owners, I would be in a full-on panic if my chihuahua, who is the size of a cat, but not as “worldly,” somehow slipped outside through the front door when I wasn’t looking. I wondered what if my dog had a cat personality? That is how Chidi came to be.
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When Allie Caldwell gets a rambling middle-of-the-night call from her very excited aunt Mel, she initially curbs her concern; her aunt has always been a bit eccentric, after all. But when Mel disappears before telling anyone what has her so worked up, Allie drops everything –even her better judgement—to fly to Ann Arbor and find her.
In the ensuing days, Allie inexplicably ignores her gut instincts (and some weird dream-based warnings from angry flying squirrels) and accepts help in the search from her aunt’s handsome, enigmatic neighbor George Bennet. In order to discern how virtual reality goggles, innovative migraine research, hidden treasure, attack drones, and a neighborhood trellis are all connected to the case, they’ll need to survive bungled bids of help from Allie’s well-meaning brother, hidden agendas from multiple neighbors, constant interruptions from Mel’s itinerant Chihuahua and his exuberant pit bull puppy pal—and even some attempts on their lives.
