All the Wind in the World Author Samantha Mabry Talks Inspiration, Emotional Damage and National Book Awards Nods with Nova Ren Suma

Samantha Mabry: Oh, wow. Nova, thanks! You know I’m such a fan of your writing, so to hear you say such nice things about mine means so much. And I’m so pleased to be having this conversation with you. The two main inspirations for All the Wind in the World were the setting and a film. I spend a good chunk of every summer out in far West Texas, where the novel is set. Most of my time out there, I spent outdoors, lounging in a hammock or taking walks. Mostly I just think and listen to the wind or the sound the soles of my shoes make on the ground or admire the scrubby brush and the cacti—there’s not much out there to do, which is wonderful. But it’s also the high desert, so there are all kinds of critters around and the elevation can lead to quick dehydration and even heatstroke. I’m just generally interested in places that are both very beautiful but also dangerous, and I hoped to capture that. Those types of places have character and histories of their own, and can act as really powerful forces on the main characters.
The film that inspired All the Wind in the World was Terrence Malick’s Days of Heaven, which itself is similar to a story in The Book of Ruth. It’s about a couple that works on a ranch harvesting crops in the Texas Panhandle for a wealthy landowner in the early 1900s. I’m obsessed with that movie, its odd narrative voice, and how it plays with that balance between beauty and danger. So, I took that kernel of a story, gave it a different setting and point of view, and then pushed it in different directions.
Suma: This leads me so beautifully into what I wanted to ask you next. It’s something I know we both love to explore in our books and what you make use of with so much fire: PLACE. Your desert is brutal and terrifying and striking all at once, and the Real Marvelous, the ranch where Sarah Jac and James find themselves, is full of magic and pain and history. Do you find that your characters are created by the place where they’re from, and is this how Sarah Jac came to be her fierce, guarded, passionate, and flawed self? And what made you decide to set this story in the future, in a world even more devastated than what we’re facing today?
Mabry: Oh. Hmm. I feel like it’s more like Sarah is out of place in the desert—she’s from the Midwest, originally. She tries to fight against the desert and show an amount of mastery over it—she speaks about running across it, and how well she can cut the maguey that grows from it—but she’s not at all in her element, and so the desert kind of defeats her. For much of the novel, she doesn’t believe in land and spirit being tied together. She doesn’t believe in signs, and she scoffs at other people’s superstitions. She believes in work and in things she can see and touch, but the nature of the desert really works against her. What sets the novel in motion is an accident that happens during a dust storm. Then later, she’s knocked down again by a bee swarm. I think that part of her character is this desire to be tough like the desert, but since the desert is older and infinitely tougher than her, she keeps getting thwarted by it. There are other characters in the book more keyed into the land and the history of the land, though.
My original goal was to write a Western in scope and in setting, but at the same time, I didn’t want to set the novel in the 1800s. That’s why I set the story in the future, after a gradual environmental collapse, meaning there’s no apocalyptic storm or outbreak of an illness or anything like that. I took care in trying to make that future realistically miserable, though. The stuff about drought, and the threat of killer bees, and the threat of water becoming too salty and toxic to drink all came from recent news stories from Texas. And the Valentine, Texas, of today honestly doesn’t look too different from the Valentine in the book.
Suma: I love what you said about Sarah Jac and the desert—almost as if she wasn’t formed by the place but in spite of it. Now, I am going to shift gears and confess something to you: One of the things I most want to write one day is a love story, one that digs deep into someone’s heart, one that hurts, one that’s worth it. Yours gave me everything I wanted as a reader. I was so taken by the love story between Sarah Jac (also I love her name, by the way, and adore saying it…Sarah Jac, Sarah Jac) and James. What makes a compelling love story for you, a love story worth telling? What was your favorite moment to write between Sarah Jac and James?

Mabry: I love stories that involve some kind of damage. That damage can arise from different past or present experiences and/or take different forms. I feel like this is how a realistic love story functions. Sarah Jac and James have had issues in their past. They’ve caused damage to each and have tried to make it right, and then have caused damage again, and have tried to make it right again. I’m not particularly interested in writing stories where two damaged characters meet and “save” one another. I’m more interested in how people can cause hurt to one another—not in a vile, abusive way, but in perhaps more subtle, less intentional ways—and then I’m interested in how those people succeed or fail in seeking forgiveness or making up for that hurt. That said, my favorite scene between Sarah Jac and James is when James has returned to the ranch after an absence and has obviously, profoundly changed. Sarah Jac’s worst fear has come to be, and when she confronts James, she’s doing it from this complicated place of anger, denial, and a pitiful version of hope. He’s damaged her in this severe way, and she can’t process it.
Suma: That’s beautiful. It’s one of the most memorable love stories I have read in recent memory. I should let you go, but before I do, I need to ask you about the surreal and amazing event that happened to you last month…when All the Wind in the World was longlisted for the National Book Award! Congratulations! Speaking of place and setting in story, where were you when it happened? And what did you do when you found out?
Mabry: Thanks! It’s been an exciting time. I teach at a community college, and I was in the workroom making copies of a handout I was going to use in class that day. When I got back to my office, I saw I had a missed call from a 212 number, and also, like, 300 Twitter notifications. I checked my voicemail, and basically everyone at Algonquin Young Readers was shouting their congrats into the phone. It was a surreal morning, but then I had to go teach my lesson about thesis statements.
Suma: What an incredibly surreal moment, I can’t even imagine! Thank you so much for answering my questions, Sam. Readers: If you want to be transported and wowed, I suggest you go grab All the Wind in the World immediately.
All the Wind in the World and The Walls Around Us are on bookshelves now.