By Kerri Linsenbigler
Associate Editor
On a November morning in 1989, Denny Wilkins awoke to a hangover and a 30-page Word document. These 30 pages, inspired by a breakup, became the foundation of “Mapping Utah: Love and War in the Wilderness,” Wilkins’ recently published novel.
“All I can say is I don’t remember writing what I found the next morning,” Wilkins, a professor of journalism and mass communication said. “As it turned out, it was the outline of what became the first third of the book.”
Packed away in a box, those pages forgotten for years. As Wilkins drove from Boulder, Colo. to Seattle about five years later, the scenery reminded him of the draft he had written. He said he imagined the novel’s protagonist driving that same path, and the inspiration for “Mapping Utah” was reborn.
The novel follows the journey of protagonist Kara as she leaves her life in the Pacific Northwest behind for a new one in Green River, Utah. Once there, her life intertwines with the story’s other protagonist, Noah. The pair falls in love and builds a relationship all while fighting the destruction of Utah’s wilderness and landscape.
“My masters degree is in environmental studies, and I had spent two intense years looking at public lands issues in the West,” Wilkins said. “I was trying to bring in everything I knew about geology and the environmental issues that are represented in public lands in Utah.”
While the environment is an underlying theme of the novel, Wilkins said “Mapping Utah” is ultimately a love story.
“If there was an author’s intent, it was to have my say how men and women should be together,” he said. “It began, and still is primarily, a love story about how these people figure out how to mesh their lives and still remain independent, decisive human beings.”
With renewed interest in his formerly forgotten draft, Wilkins began collecting a huge amount of physical research. He accumulated maps, brochures, documents and more to better tell the story of Kara and Noah. Wilkins even drove the path Kara takes in the novel, wanting to accurately describe the dramatic landscape the story was set in.
“A thousand miles with a tape recorder in my hand,” Wilkins said. “Oh God, I love that road. It is a spectacular place to have characters and plot develop.”
Wilkins compiled all of his research and imagination into a completed draft of “Mapping Utah,” which he sent out to 70 literary agents in the summer of 2000. Of these, 69 responded with a standard reply of “thanks, but no thanks.” One agent, however, told Wilkins the draft was good but much too long. After editing down the story and writing in suggestions of colleagues, Wilkins again shelved the project. It lay forgotten once more until a former student of Wilkins stepped in to save it.
“For the past couple of years, I’ve been writing another (novel),” Wilkins said. “Kelly (Zientek-Baker) had read an earlier draft of “Mapping Utah” eight or nine years ago, so I asked her if she would read this new thing. She asked me about ‘Mapping Utah.’ She said ‘I believe in that book.’”
So with a push from Zientek-Baker, “Mapping Utah” once again became a living document. According to Wilkins, Zientek-Baker conceptually and line edited the manuscript, as well as brought in another former student, Holly McIntyre Hartigan to design the book’s cover.
“This book doesn’t exist without Kelly’s push,” Wilkins said. “She researched all of these print-on-demand and e-book sites. She made the decisions of what were the best places to go.”
“Mapping Utah” is available on Amazon as a Kindle or Nook e-book or as a downloadable PDF on Smashwords.
From its beginnings so many years ago, “Mapping Utah” has gone through a transformative journey, according to Wilkins.
“It is unrecognizable from 25 years ago,” he said. “Kara is no longer based on who she was originally based on. She is Kara.”
linsenka10@bonaventure.edu
