Author’s Notes
Northern Lights is a story about who I was as a young man at about 21 years of age. At that time in my life, I was trying to make decisions about a lot of things: what to do in life, what kind of person I wanted to be, how I wanted to live, what I believed, and how I would pursue what I found fascinating, beautiful, and inspiring. Even at that age, I still had a lot of growing up to do. I hadn’t arrived at anything yet. I was still deeply influenced by my past: growing up as a kid in rural Iowa, moving to the West Coast for a time and feeling out of place, and then moving back to the Midwest and feeling like an outsider yet again. I’ve always been more of an outside observer rather than a cozy insider with a lot of close friends. I’ve never really belonged anywhere. I still can’t name a specific place I would call my home.
Those kinds of feelings and thoughts are deeply rooted in the fabric of who I am, and they come out all over the place in the story. I can’t escape the fact that I’m a plain-spoken man from the Midwest, accustomed to flat fields of corn and beans, long stretches of empty highway, small towns scattered every five to six miles apart on old rail lines, and an endless patchwork of family farms dotting the countryside. Big city life is something I’ve always shied away from, and I’ve learned to enjoy and appreciate the relaxed pace and quiet solitude of country life.
So, I’ve tried to incorporate all of those original qualities of who I was into Northern Lights. The main character, Leo, is definitely me, of course, or who I was as a young man back in college. I have to admit, though, it’s been a long time. I’ve changed a lot since then. Now, from this distant perspective, I’ve definitely taken some poetic license in telling the story, but basically, it hits pretty close to home. It’s a story about who I was growing up, who I am now, and who I am becoming as I move on into the future.
Northern Lights is also about my favorite place in all the world: the Boundary Waters Canoe Area of Northern Minnesota. When I think about where I’d like to go on vacation, where I’d like to retire someday, or where I’d like to be right now, it’s always up there. Paddling across the wide-open lakes and exploring the wilderness along the Canadian border in a canoe has always been the place where I’ve been most at peace. It began for me years ago back in college, when I got a job as a canoe guide in the Boundary Waters. I immediately fell in love with the place, with everything about it, and it changed my life and who I am forever. That’s what happens to Leo in the story too. So, it’s definitely personal for me. I can’t escape it. It’s a part of who I am and always will be.
Northern Lights is loosely connected to another place I’ve grown to love: the big city of Chicago. I’ll always be a country boy at heart, but the Windy City is a place I’ve visited many times over the years. I’ve made a few friends there too, and their personalities come out in one of the main characters in the book. I find big-city life to be fascinating, but it’s also a lot like a foreign country to me. I know I’ll never be completely at home there, but I’ve grown to respect and admire the people who live there. City life comes with a complex array of issues, problems, and possibilities. Some of those aspects, hopefully, come out in the character, Aria, who brings a distinct flair to her role in the story. She’s not like every big-city girl, certainly, but she is a combination of many qualities and sensibilities that come from growing up in a large urban center. She’s found her way to me, even, a country boy from Iowa. She’s become a part of me, and I have to admit, I’ve grown to accept, appreciate, and truly enjoy that fact.
Northern Lights is also about another place that took me by complete surprise: New Zealand, of all places! Actually, it’s not so much the place as it is the person, Esther, the other main character who comes to life in the story. As I began to write her into the story, I wondered what kind of person she would be and where she would be from. Eventually, I found myself on the other side of the world and in a different hemisphere altogether. At first, I worried that I wouldn’t be able to adequately incorporate such a character into the story, but I pushed on anyway, and as I did so, I became obsessed with all things Kiwi! The language and culture fascinated me, not to mention all the times I’d watched the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and wished I could visit there someday. The character, Esther, quickly became the light and life of the story. The way she talks and acts and goes about life in such a carefree manner; it’s how I wish I could live my life too. I found myself a bit obsessed with her speech, her mannerisms, and her character. I learned a lot of new words and phrases that only she would say. They’ve wiggled their way into my life, into the way I talk, and into the way I try to live my life from day to day. I’ve been forever changed by Esther. Perhaps she’ll have a similar effect on your life in some way too.
Finally, Northern Lights is about the mystical and magical world of the stars and constellations in the night sky high above. I’ve always been fascinated with distant stars and galaxies and planets and constellations. They’ve inspired people throughout history. So, naturally, the ancient tales of gods and goddesses somehow found their way into this one as well. If you read carefully, you’ll discover another mystical layer to the story, weaving its way through the lives of the characters on the pages. Some of those things are pretty obvious, while others may be more hidden from view. I’ve spent many nights out under the stars, gazing up into the starry heavens high above, so I couldn’t help but weave my love of the stars into the fabric of this story too. If you’ve ever been to the Boundary Waters, you’d totally understand. It’s what you do when you go there. It’s inescapable. So inevitably, the stars and planets and constellations found their way into the story too.
As I began writing Northern Lights, something else began to happen. As a songwriter and guitar player, I began to think of how some of the scenes of the story would play out in a musical form. Songs just sort of come to me. I don’t know how to explain it, but it just happens. Well, that’s what began to happen as I wrote Northern Lights. As I worked through a scene in the book, suddenly a tune would come, then a simple refrain, then more verses, and eventually an entire song. A friend called them “paddling songs,” and we laughed about how they were about so many typical things you’d see up there: the loons, bears, moose, the northern lights, the stars, waterfalls, campfires, windy lakes, calm glassy lakes, sunsets on the lakes, and of course, more loons.
I’ve brought my guitar on many trips into the Boundary Waters. The amazing scenery, incredible experiences, and rugged challenges of life in the wilderness lend themselves naturally to poetry and music of all kinds. When I gave the main character, Leo, a guitar to bring along on his adventures into the North Woods, that’s when the music really started to flow. The songs describe the journey of the characters in the book and are inspired by an area of the Boundary Waters that I’ve paddled through many times. If you compare the story to the music, I’m sure you’ll agree that they were meant to be together.
I had as much fun writing the music as I did the story itself. They fed off each other and pushed each other along to the point where I finally had to say, “Enough!” After obsessing about the story and then the music too, I have to admit, it’s all become a part of who I am. When I began the writing process, I didn’t exactly know what to expect, but it’s in me now, all of it, both the story and the music. I can’t imagine either one without the other. It’s the same with the three main characters in Northern Lights; they’re inseparable too. They were always meant to be together. They will always be a part of each other, and they’ll always be a part of me too.
So, I hope you enjoy Northern Lights. Maybe I should say, I hope you find as much enjoyment in reading or listening to it as I did in writing it. It’s been an unusual and challenging journey for me, but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed every part. I’ve been inspired to make many parts of the story truly mine in my real life today. Maybe it will inspire you to do the same thing in your life too. I sincerely hope so.
Leo Solstrom