EvC x Climate Book Reviews: "She’s a Killer" author Kirsten McDougall

Climate Book Reviews is co-hosted by EvC's own Ed Whittingham and his friend Roger Thompson, Associate Dean and Professor of Writing and Rhetoric at Stony Brook University in New York. 

Each episode highlights some climate related books worth knowing about. This episode is an interview with New Zealand author Kirsten McDougall about her novel, She’s a Killer. At times hilarious and at other times troubling, the book is set in the not-too-distant future and features a near genius with sociopathic tendencies facing the realities of her severely climate impacted world. For more info on the CBR podcast, check out climatebookreviews.com 

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Ed Whittingham: Hi, Ed here. Here at EVC, we wanted to share an episode from another podcast that I'm part of. It combines two of my interests, climate and books. It's an occasional pod called Climate Book Reviews, and I co host it with my old friend, Dr. Roger Thompson, an associate dean and professor of writing and rhetoric at Stony Brook University in New York.

The goal we share is to curate some books worth knowing about. For more info, check out climatebookreviews. com. That's Climate Book Reviews. The particular episode we're sharing is from September 2024, when Roger and I interviewed Kiwi author Kirsten McDougall about her novel, She's a Killer. At times hilarious, and at other times troubling, She's a Killer is set in the not too distant future and features a near genius with sociopathic tendencies facing the realities of her severely climate impacted world.

I could tell you more, but I think it's best if we hear from the writer herself. So Roger, over to you. 

Roger Thompson: Welcome everyone to this episode of Climate Book Reviews. We're really pleased to have you. I'm Roger Thompson and my co host is Ed Winningham. Hello everyone. 

Ed Whittingham: And I, I just want to say, I'm really looking forward to this conversation that we're going to have with the guest, Roger, that you are about to introduce.

Roger Thompson: Yes, we're happy. We're really thrilled to have Kirsten McDougal with us. Who's novel, She's a Killer is, I would call it just a brisk, fun. That equally distressing read, it kind of sneaks up, at least for me, it kind of snuck up on me and kind of, well, it moves fast, but it was going along. And then suddenly I feel like I got, uh, you know, hit in the heart.

A couple of times, uh, rollicking at times, just hilarious. And so really pleased to have you here, Kirsten, and, uh, want to welcome you to the show. 

Kirsten McDougall: Kiora from, um, Aotearoa, New Zealand. I'm delighted to be on your show. Thanks for inviting me. 

Roger Thompson: Absolutely. I thought we'd start with, uh, our listeners will know that we've, uh, we stuck with nonfiction in the past and we're, we're moving here into fiction.

And so I thought that might give us an interesting way to start the conversation, which is we have a lot of our listeners are kind of, you know, Really on the ground doing work around climate. And, uh, so it made me wonder about. What it might mean as a fiction writer to be writing around climate as opposed to nonfiction.

What's it, uh, uh, what's it mean in terms of framing your thinking, uh, about climate issues and what, what fiction might do that nonfiction can't do. 

Kirsten McDougall: Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for the question. It's, it's a big question. And, um, first I'd like to just say, um, Hello, kia ora to your, to your listeners and, um, to those people working in climate change spaces and, and whatever capacity.

Every day, um, it seems we're faced with new pieces of data, things getting hotter, um, problems with water, you know, species extinction, and it's, it feels really dark. And I suppose that's a good place for me to start because when I was turning my head to a new novel in 2019, um, I was getting woken at night just thinking about the climate.

I've got two Children as well. Um, so, you know, you think about what you're passing on or the effects or non effects you're making in your own life and the climate really, really changed that. worried me. And it was one of those things that would keep me awake at three in the morning. And when it came to writing a novel, um, you know, you, you look around for what is pulling on your, your attention and what's, what's filling your brain space and your dream space.

And it really was climate change. So, which seems, um, a really depressing thing to write about as well. And, you know, it's everywhere we go, we'll, we'll, we'll pick up, um, bits of news or, um, you know, books on climate change and it's hard reading. And so what I wanted to do was somehow write a novel that was help people to think about climate change in a way that was different to say when you're faced with pieces of hard facts, or, you know, sometimes you get people saying, well, if really dedicated to, um, change, you must live in this very prescribed way.

You must not drive a car, you must, you know, not eat dairy, not eat meat, you've got to walk everywhere, you, you can't take long haul flights, which is a very tricky thing for New Zealanders because we live, um, at, right at the bottom of the world, we're an island, a lot of us have family who live on the other side of the world, um, so that's something we think about quite hard.

So you start to feel like even if you make these what look like dramatic changes in the modern and neo liberal. economic system that we live in. Um, even if you make those changes, the flight's still going to leave, you know, the dairy's still being produced and polluting our beautiful rivers in New Zealand.

Um, you know, all of these things went into this novel, but I put jokes in it as a way to try and Help the reader, but it was really, truly a way to help myself write it as well. 

Ed Whittingham: I've got to jump in there because the book, it's, it's wonderful. And echo what Roger said, it was a brisk read. It was a lot of fun.

It was funny. It has. Uh, a particularly terrifying character that you wouldn't expect to be terrifying until you get introduced to her and get into the novel, but it's got this central character protagonist, Alice, who is this near genius IQ, but she's deeply fall flawed and very checked out about anything to do with climate change.

You know, she's giving up. She's a slacker. She could be a leader, but she's actually a crappy follower. And then she gets looped into a climate like climate action. And, uh, you know, no spoiler alerts here, but, uh, you know, it's a form of direct action. What are you trying to say with this character? Uh, you know, that's obviously not you, but then what you, when I just heard you as listening, there are parts of Alice that actually sensed in what you're saying.

Kirsten McDougall: Oh, horrors. I don't want to be Alice. Alice has stopped caring because it's actually too The job of caring and trying to make change is too hard. So her response to this in the world is to not care about anything and to take advantage of the situation she's found herself in, which is in New Zealand. I'm very vague about the, um, the timeframe, but I say, you know, a few years from now where there's been, um, climate catastrophe happening around the world, New Zealand's been, um, slightly less affected.

So we've had this, um, what the New Zealand government in the novel has done is, um, say, well, if you can pay X amount of, you know, you know, millions of dollars, then we'll give you, um, a refugee status here. I guess I was trying to think about what, what would New Zealand do then? And we've not had a very, um, open door policy.

Should we say to refugees, um, but I think that if, if people can, you know, help a country out of debt, then the government's opening their doors to them. But yeah, so Alice has just gone, well, I'm going to take advantage of these wealth UGs. I, sorry, the refugees in the books, I call them wealth UGs because refugee is a word that's generally assigned to people who have lost everything.

These people, well, they've lost, um, Their ability to live in their countries, but they've got a lot of money and so they can afford to come here and bring a certain lifestyle with them. And 

Roger Thompson: Kirsten, did you coined that term? I wondered the same thing. I love that terminology so much. I've already been using it because I like it so much.

Kirsten McDougall: Well, yeah, I did. Just kind of. Made it up as I was writing and then I Googled for it later and I couldn't find it. So I guess, you know, I mean, I often think that ideas in the world happen, you know, often at the same time or they get shared. So maybe there's someone else out in the world and yay you, if you, you came up with that as well.

But, um, that's the term I use in the book because it was also sort of, I suppose I used it slightly. Ironically, and that these, you know, these people say, Oh, well, I've lost everything. Um, so they sort of act like a victim, but actually they've, they've got money and they, there are people left behind in their countries who don't have money and who can't leave.

So, yeah. I mean, I suppose what I was trying to do as well as, um, explore. The way money enables some people to move and act and others not, you know, I'm, I'm very interested in the way neoliberalism and capitalism has captured all of our systems. Including the way, the ways in which we think. And I find that terrifying because I don't think it's an answer to climate change.

To get back to Alice though, I, sorry I'm going down little, little rabbit holes on my own here. Um, I really wanted to create a character who's sort of represented both our inertia on a personal level. That we feel when we're faced with these massive challenges of climate change, but also the inertia and, um, head in the sand approach that a lot of our governments and, um, large businesses take to climate change.

And that it's just to continue as if, I don't know, some God's going to pop down and change things miraculously. Um, Whereas, you know, we, we are the only ones, our, our governments with decent regulation, our businesses being forced to follow that regulation and us as voting citizens are the only ones who can change things.

Um, and that's a slow kind of progress through the novel, um, for Alice to come to a point where she recognizes that actually, you know, one of the last words I use in the last sentence is this word complicit. We are all complicit. Um, and I don't want to use that in a like. Well, it's all of our fault. Well, I mean, it is all of our fault.

But, um, if we take responsibility, If we face up to that responsibility, maybe then we can, we can make change. Perhaps not in the way that the novel, um, is slightly ambivalent. 

Roger Thompson: I mean, the way you're talking, I want to be clear, especially for our listeners. This is not a polemic at all. This, this novel, it is a character driven, really energetic, right.

Humor. And, um, you walk this line though, where the climate is kind of this, the climate Challenges or this, the crises that we're facing are kind of in the background for a lot, but you don't have long disquisitions anywhere, note anyway, really about some of the issues you're talking about. I said, it's kind of, it's this kind of presence, right, that.

That Alice seems kind of, you know, she's going about her life and making quips and demeaning people at times and trying to figure herself out running from her feelings clearly. And yet there's this kind of character kind of pushing, pushing us along all the way through. And so I'm curious about. You know, the, the tension there, right, on one hand, you've got really, I mean, you're very thoughtfully considered the issues at stake here.

And I'm curious, so did you find yourself going down kind of research rabbit holes or was it that you just kind of chased the character of Alice? To see how that kind of bubbled up some of these climate problems that you, as you described for yourself, kind of waking, and, and Ed and I talked about this, Ed's had the same, I have had the same experience with Mill and I like, what are we doing, man?

Like what, how are we going to, and, and I think plenty of children are waking up with this very thing. So I'm curious about that tension between kind of sharing the message and trying to get people prompting and this kind of character driven energy that's going through the text. 

Kirsten McDougall: Well, um, yeah, and thank you.

That's, that's a really thoughtful question that I, I don't think I've been quite asked that explicitly about before. I mean, first and foremost, I am a fiction writer. I, I'm not a, I'm not a, um, a non fiction writer. The thing that I have the most responsibility to in a story is, is, are the characters, you know?

So, um, I think that if I was to write just about the ideas, it would get really boring quite quickly, you know, and it would become polemic. And that's really off putting to a reader, you know, you, we don't turn to stories, um, to the imaginative spaces of, um, you know, novels and film and, and music and art.

We want ideas from them. Yes. But I think that what's useful about art in terms of exploring the big problems we face is that it approaches those issues from, um, the issue, you can sort of sneak in sideways to the issue, you know, so you, you, you want to offer the reader the experience of the character.

And in this case, it's a, quite a selfish, almost kind of. Um, very blinkered, quite blind person who's, um, just kind of wants to do whatever she wants to do. She just thinks, well, the world's going to end. I'm going to just, You know, carry on. So then my responsibility is to, yeah, as you say, build those pressures of climate change and the way her world has changed around her, because that will affect her actions and, and, um, the actions of the other people around her.

There's always a tension in writing fiction where, which you've quite rightly, um, identified where there's this sort of outside pressure, or what you might think of as, um, plot devices or pressure on plot choices in terms of plotting, and then how, how the characters forging their way through that, and it's, it's a fine line.

You know, because you, you want things to feel almost like they're naturally unfolding, not like things are happening so much to the, and I, I don't know if I'm more successful in She's a Killer. I mean, there's a lot happens in it, you know, and I wanted a lot to happen. I really wanted to write, Like I knew from the start that there would be a big explosion towards the end.

You know, I wanted, I wanted my car chasing, you know, if you're, if you're thinking in terms of kind of, um, genre or whatever, um, and, and, you know, Alice is sort of a failed psychologist. She, she wanted to be, you know, she, she was, um, this sort of near genius and putting this in quite marks. She's actually quite stupid when it comes to, you know, her emotional intelligence and the way she acts in the world.

But, um, and I think, but that, that's like. Psych, um, interest in psychology and fear and stress is, comes out of my own interest in the way we behave. And, and that is probably why I write fiction because all fiction, all action comes out of character, 

Ed Whittingham: you know? Could, could I ask Kirsten, and, and so I will say there is a little bit of a spoiler alert in this question.

So, uh, in this, this, um, slightly dystopian future and, It's slightly dystopian because, you know, prices, food prices are through the roof, water is privatized, your character Alice has to pay for allowances, only one liter a day, and all these things that make living difficult for everyone but the wealthy UGs who can afford it, or the, the couple Uh, that you have who end up becoming, it's interesting that Amy, her childhood friend, and Pete, her successful architect husband, who you think would fade away, and then they actually become such a focal point later on in the book, but in this case, you propose, you don't propose, while the character, uh, pursues violence as a solution.

And in essence, killing the people who are the problem. And in this case, like you said, your car scene blowing shit up as a way of addressing the climate problem. And is this, is this because when you look into the future, do you, and this is a huge topic of discussion and debate now, do you foresee more violence?

Is it, we are, are we getting to a point? Where that they're just not willing to, you know, accept the world as it is, or the next round of international climate talks, like we got to take things into our own hands and we got to break some eggs. 

Kirsten McDougall: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And yeah, we haven't even talked about Erica, who is the 15, 16 year old and is the sort of, um, one of the main characters in the book.

And Erica's a radical, um, she's been radicalized from, from when she was a child and, and trained to act and, um, you know, to be very proficient and, um, taking people out. I'm sure you, you, you know, um, none of us are young people, but I feel so angry some days. About. The way the world is going and, and the lack of action I've, I've, I see, you know, in New Zealand we've had, um, we had the climate marches on Fridays that, you know, I think Greta Thunberg, um, sort of started these sit ins and we've had these here with the young, young students and I've gone on them with my own children and, you know, yeah.

And every year these, these, um, these, these talks where, you know, leaders meet and, you know, then issue some sort of. Um, proclamation about, Oh, we're going to try and have another talk next year. And we're going to try and, you know, we really want to keep it under 1. 5, but we all know 1. 5 is probably gone now.

I think that it's a natural human reaction to go, well, actually, all right, you know, you're not changing anything through talking. No one's regulating anything. To, to a, um, degree of, um, you know, making any efficient change. So I'm gonna start like, making things really, really difficult for you. And if that means, um, people, people dying, then yeah, I can, I can totally imagine that there'll be some people who are wanting to act in that way.

And I understand where that rage comes from. 'cause I feel it myself, although I'm not driven to, um. But I also think that things will get to a stage where, uh, with food insecurity and, uh, you know, and water insecurity and housing. I mean, I don't know what it's like, um, in, in the States or in Canada now, but in New Zealand, we've got a massive housing crisis.

We've got, um, you know, young people can, there's like, you know, I speak to young people I work with and, um, In their twenties and even in their thirties, and they can't even see themselves being able to afford to buy a house. And so these issues eat up their attention as well. So I think that if you, if we have a society where young people just from, from very early on, they're worried about climate change and they, they grow up and they can see, you know, a few new people doing really, really well and, and they move through their lives and they're disenfranchised still by the time they get to their thirties.

They're going to feel really angry and they're going to want to do something about it. So, um, and part of me says, bring it on. You know, and I'm, so I'm Gen X, I wrote Alice as a slacker because, you know, Gen X, we lackers, uh, you know, in a way we felt, you know, I've been thinking about this recently because I think like Winona Ryder's been in the media recently, they've got this new Beetlejuice, um, um, movie.

And I, you know, she was really sort of an icon of slackerdom and, you know, but I was thinking about that idea of the slacker. And we really did feel kind of done to by. Our parents who were boomers and through that, the neoliberal explosion that happened here in the eighties. And I think, you know, and, and elsewhere in the world slightly earlier.

And in the nineties, when I was sort of coming of age, um, you know, unemployment was, youth unemployment was hugely high. Um, we had this very punitive finance minister here that, and, and, uh, in the early nineties, it made things very difficult here. And, but our, our, our kind of reaction to that was to go. Oh, yeah.

Whatever. So we turned to art as well. You know, I've got a lot of, most of my friends are artists and musicians and, um, you know, we've kind of struggled to make a living on those reels as we've gone on. And um, I, I, I get the rage and, and things have to change. And I'm kind of really interested at the moment I'm listening to Empire.

I don't know if you listened to that podcast or the William Dalrymple and Anita Arnaud. It's a BBC podcast and it's about, Differently, like they look at different empires. I'm listening to the Ottoman empire at the moment. And I mean, history is littered with youth overthrowing the old orders. And, and I totally see that could be a way we go.

I 

Roger Thompson: want to go back to your statement, right? You know, bring it on. Right. I mean, this is, um, provocative statement, right. And I really, it's reminding me of, uh, monkey wrench gang. And, but again, your novel wasn't like that. It's, it's not. I mean, that's kind of a polemic novel, right? It is characters driven in certain ways, but you got this thing where violence is the, is the identified as the solution.

And here you have a central character who kind of, like I said, kind of slacker, you know, letting the world happen. And then suddenly it's kind of, I can't even really say that we're seduced into it. It's kind of, I mean, there's seduction there and you have the, you have this early scene with Pablo and the, you know, we'll kill them all or whatever, you know, and this, you know, this orgasmic reverie around that.

Uh, but that, that really doesn't even do enough to prefigure what's going to, what's going to happen to the violence that explodes. Right. And, um, so there's this different, more ticking time bomb thing going on. 

Kirsten McDougall: Yeah. And maybe the thing is that Erica offers, you know, with that sort of very black and white definite version of the world that a teenager can have, no, this is the way the world is and they haven't been knocked around by, you know, the rest of their life yet.

And that is very seductive, right? A person who comes like, I mean, I think someone like Greta Thunberg is so wonderful because there's such a certainty about her. You know, and she, she stood there, you know, that meme that there was of her just giving Trump the side eye and, you know, and him kind of like, who is this upset little girl?

And she just stood there, solid in her aggressive Tonberg ness and going, well, who the f are you? You know, how dare you tell me you're my generation. That this is the world we're going to end up with, you know, and so in the novel, that is very, um, and the fact that Erica is also a genius, you know, and that appeals to Alice's, um, vanity and her, her ego, finally, someone who's slightly smarter than me, I mean, that is, that, that kind of certainty or worldview.

In the face of a void of a way to, to solve these issues, you know, Erica is offering up, offering up a solution that is, you know, right or wrong, I'll let you be the judge, but it's, it's a solution where there hasn't been one. 

Roger Thompson: Would you think of your novel then as an activist novel? I mean, this is, and I know, you know, I'm, I'm hesitant to pigeonhole or categorize too heavily.

Um, to me, this is just a really. Really enjoyable character driven. I mean, Alice is a hell of a character. I mean, you've really created a hell of a character. Um, and there is a type of transformation in her while also an uncomfortable one. Right. And so I kind of don't think of it as an activist novel, but it's hard to read it and not at the end of it, Yeah, what, what do I need to do?

Like what, and, and that, that bit you said a little while ago, I was, I was actually going to read your last sentence because where you had that word complicity, because I, I thought that was so brilliant. I, and I don't know that I saw it anywhere else in novel. I don't remember, do a Google book search and see if it's in there, but it's impossible to come out of the end of that and not feel like even if we're not Alice, even if we're not Erica or that whole.

We feel complicit in some sort of way by not acting, even though we may not want to go that far with violence. 

Ed Whittingham: The last, the last five words, complicit in the quiet afternoon. 

Roger Thompson: Yeah. So it's a lovely flourish. Such a great ending. I mean, really, you had a wonderful, oh, 

Kirsten McDougall: thank you. I write, I wrote it because I write novels and, um, I loved the character and it answers A lot of the, um, and I hate to say this 'cause I don't think, you know, writing is therapy, but it was cathartic because I got to actually put a lot on my rage and make jokes and, and throw these characters into a whirlwind situation.

And that, that is, um, you know, because actually novel writing, writing fiction is the thing that I love most, most, most in the world. Next to my family, of course, this is just what I came up with. And I don't see myself as an activist, even though I'm drawn to, you know, throughout my life. I've, I've, I've.

Been in various different movements. I worked for a union. I, but I'm not like, I work with actual organizers and activists and I know that I'm not one of them. I'm just someone who can write some lines. I don't know. Why, why do we make art? I guess. And why do I suppose more the question is why do I, why do I want to partake in art?

Why do I want to read novels? And I suppose it's because I want my world view to be I, like, I love it when a novel will slightly shift my world view or open me up to another way of thinking or, um, thinking about an issue that, you know, I might already be familiar with even, um, and I think that's the power of transcribing.

Art and of, of the novel in particular. It's, I mean, I've, I think I've said this before, um, in interviews, that the novel is a great big thought experiment. And it's one where, so it's not an article size or like a podcast size. I'm a huge listener of podcasts. I, I, I adore this as a form now. Um, but the novel is it's slow burn and if you stick with reading a novel, you're kind of sucked into its world and its energy.

I think that for. The time being at least of reading it can tinkers around with your synapses a bit, you know, and the way that, you know, you go to see a great band and you might leave on a total high, you know, um, I mean, if that's a form of activism, then cool. 

Ed Whittingham: I mean, I, I personally didn't see it as an activist book.

I didn't see it as a client, a client science fiction book. I see it as a really good rollicking, fast paced novel. That's got a thriller aspect. It's got comedy, it's got great characters. But what I really appreciated is you've created a plausible near future in a rapidly warming world and food becomes very expensive.

Some countries actually do well, or do, let's say, less bad than others, given climate models. And that's a very contentious issue within the climate science community. It is very plausible, and New Zealand could very well do well. Canada could do well. And so as a result, this whole concept of wealth, UG, which I searched as well.

And it's the only time it pops up, it's associated with you. So I think you can justify, I would claim that you've coined this term, if not the concept, but that's certainly the term that that is a very plausible thing as well. And just like you'd mentioned with Canada has the same housing crisis and the same despondent youth who can never imagine owning a house.

I see it in my own children. And we've got very high immigration levels. And when you talk to people, why are you coming to Canada? They say, well, free education, free health care. Pretty soon I could imagine it being because where I lived in my, you know, mid latitude or equatorial country, that it just became unlivable.

And I needed a place where I could actually live and raise a family and still have access to water. And, and in addition to just the changes, In the economy and the changes in the natural world, the changes in characters are also very plausible. So someone like Alice. Who just stops reading anything to do about climate change, because although she's super bright, knows what's going on, she shuts down and that's her coping mechanism.

And then this, the couple who becomes survivalists and, and very selfish and they have the means and they say, okay, we see the world's going to hell in a handbasket. So we're buying our property and we're going to build a house. You know, our fortress around it with other like minded people, we'll take care of ourselves and no one else.

So it creates this incredible selfishness. That's very plausible. And then this character of Erica, who is an international trappler, and she's almost like a climate ninja, who's been trained with the really fun part of the book. And what I mentioned, there's a terrifying character in there. I found Erica terrifying in terms of what she could do.

That that too is plausible. And so you've managed to take a highly plausible future and. Wrap it up into this wonderful fiction book. And I think that's, that's the, the amazing trick that you've pulled off. 

Kirsten McDougall: Well, thank you. Yeah. I mean, um, I actually think I didn't go far enough with the price of cauliflower though, there's like two for 10, but actually, I don't know if it was last year or the year before you could buy, it was 15 for a cauliflower here at one point.

And I was like, man, I did not go far enough. You know, we've got, um, billionaires buying up, uh, bolt holes here in New Zealand. You know, I, I know people who are going down survivalist routes, like regular New Zealanders as well. So it's all kind of happening. 

Ed Whittingham: Yeah. And just, just a personal story. So in Canada now, as a result of climate change.

Uh, we're getting more wildfires, and the wildfires that happen are more intense. You can't say, yeah, it's not, it's not, you can't say this climate, wildfires because of climate change, this one isn't. You can't say that, but you can talk about probability. And for the first time this summer, I know someone whose house burned down because of a wildfire.

Close to where I live. 30 percent of a town called Jasper, in a national park called Jasper, 30 percent of the structure is burned. On one hand, I have great empathy and I've done my best to help out. On the other hand, I'm calling my insurer and saying, Well, fuck, if my house burns down, what's my rebuild value?

Oh, it's that number? You say X, no, I think it's X plus 20 percent and suddenly now I'm in the state of negotiation, it's very self interest motivated, but 

Kirsten McDougall: this is the world we're operating in, right? And that's what I'm talking about. Like we actually, um, and I suppose that's why I go to kind of radical action.

We need to reimagine that. Every single part of the system and the way that we operate, like the, the, the sort of the insurance thing is really a good example because here it's become, it's getting much, much harder. It's so expensive to insure your house. And I know people who are going without contents insurance now just to, to, to do their house and afford their house insurance.

There are places where they are getting really funny about, well, Will we ensure you if you live on the coast, you know, because we've got coastal inundation here, um, fires are not so much a problem here yet, I say, those fires terrify me, um, you know, maybe we should say, well, we're not going to ensure you if you live near this place, because it's impossible.

We can't afford to do that. Everyone needs to actually figure out a way to build in the sustainable way in this part. And we're gonna, you know, um, deal with water in this way. And, but then in the meantime, all of these decisions are still being made in this very, um, you know, left versus right, um, political system that we, we've actually got a very, very right wing, very punitive government that's just come in late last year, um, in New Zealand.

And it's terrifying some of the decisions they're making. I mean, they're opening up. Oil exploration here in New Zealand. Again, 

Ed Whittingham: I'm going to be speaking at an event in Calgary in three weeks time with just, uh, just Jacinda Ardern, your ex PM. No, 

Kirsten McDougall: no, 

Ed Whittingham: I'm not saying to share stage with her, but we'll be at the speaking of the same event, but she seems pretty amazing.

I'm sorry to hear that you've had this shift and frankly, on a political side, we're seeing that shift. We, this place you're going to go to in October, um, which has had this center left government. It could fall in an October election, and then not just a right wing government comes in, but a very staunchly anti climate right wing government led by a guy who disputes, you know, any anthropogenic cause of climate change.

So now we're seeing this backlash. Yeah. 

Kirsten McDougall: It's mental. It's mental. Like, how can these people even exist and how can they, you know, possibly claim any power that's, it's out of fear, you know, people are really scared. And so they're doing, I guess, what, what Alice does in the book and I bury their head in the sand and they say, no, the Anthropocene isn't a thing, you know, 

Roger Thompson: well, it's, it's a response to some of those underground things like you're talking about and your insurance rates or you're not being covered.

You look, you know, scary, but it's also you, you want to figure out what to do. And so it's easy to go back to what's worked in the past. And it won't, I mean, I'm thinking of Florida here where they insurers have just abandoned a lot of that state, just saying we can't insure in the state anymore. What's it mean?

How do we handle that? We're starting to run down on time here. So I, I thought as a kind of closing question, it, we'll see if it's fair or not, I wanted to kind of rewind a little bit to what you just said, you know, that you, you do these, you do, you know, you write novels as do. I think probably most novelists, um, to kind of work through certain things and, and you like when you get to a point where you feel like you've changed or learned something.

So I'm curious, you know, what's your experience with this novel for that? You know, what did, what did Alice teach you? 

Kirsten McDougall: Oh, goodness. No, I don't know that. I don't know that characters do that. I, I think, I, I guess one of the things that I, that has come out of this novel is, um, people really enjoyed the humor.

So, and I think it's the first time that I really tried to flex my kind of that side of my writing muscle in any way. And I think that that's been useful because climate change is big and scary. And if we're going to tackle it, we need, we need to be able to laugh and we need to laugh together. You know, I'm, I'm a big advocate for, um, using humor as a way to sort of oil, oil the social wheels as we, as we move along.

Roger Thompson: That's great. I mean, Ed and I talk about this a lot. Ed's got a history. Comedy and funny man, no, no doubt. And so, uh, 

Ed Whittingham: long, long talked about a project called the lighter side of environmental catastrophe. 

Roger Thompson: And, you know, I guess I would say in closing from my perspective, I'll, I'll let Ed have the last word though.

The, uh, you know, if, if this was your first foray, really flexing that muscle, I hope you do more of it because it, it works, it works really well. Um, at least for me as a reader. 

Kirsten McDougall: Thank you. Yeah. 

Ed Whittingham: Yeah. And I, I can't top that. Um, it's a great read. And, uh, as I say, it's not only as an entertaining read, it's also this glimpse as to how things might play out in the not very Distant future.

So, uh, it's in that way, it was 

Roger Thompson: instructive too. Kirsten, thank you so much for joining us. And 

Kirsten McDougall: lovely to speak to you both and, and to meet you. 

Roger Thompson: Absolutely. Thanks so much. 

Ed Whittingham: Thanks for listening to energy versus climate. The show is created by David Keith, Sarah Hicks Simon, and me, Ed Whittingham and produced by Emmett Tandon.

With help from Crystal Hickey and Venuki Arachichi. Our title and show music is The Wind Up by Brian Lipps. This season of Energy vs. Climate is produced with support from the University of Calgary's Office of the Vice President Research and the University's Global Research Initiative. Further support comes from the Trache Family Foundation, the North Family Foundation, the Palmer Family Foundation, and you, our generous listeners.

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