Anne Hillerman On Her Father's Legacy, Finding Her Own Voice, And Dark Winds

Author of the Leaphorn, Chee, and Manuelito series of Native American crime fiction novels, Anne Hillerman inherited both her passion for writing, and her series' characters, from her late father, legendary writer Tony Hillerman. In this exclusive chat with Cowboys & Indians, Hillerman discusses how and why she took on the world of her father's invention, fans' reactions to her style and works, how she put together the 10th and latest book in her own section of the series, and her thoughts on the AMC television show "Dark Winds," which is based on the Leaphorn, Chee, and Manuelito stories. 

Transcript

Cowboys & Indians: I wanted to first thank you for taking some time out of your very busy schedule to do this interview with me. It's been something I know we've been remiss on covering for a long time, and I'm glad to be the one to right that injustice.

Anne Hillerman: I'm happy to talk to you.

C&I: I always love to start any interview with a little icebreaker, so just throw a little fun question your way. Leaphorn, Chee, and Manuelito — pick one to have a beer with, one to go on a road trip with, and one to have a shootout with.

Hillerman: Well, none of them drink, but I would say probably Chee would be the one to go with to a bar. I’d do a road trip with Bernie, and so I'd do the shootout with Leaphorn because he's had more experience

C&I: You can't go wrong when the chips are down with someone with experience, right?

Hillerman: That's right.

C&I: Fun aside, we're here to talk about you and your long career and it's still going. We've got what, I think it's number 10, right? Shadow of the Solstice for you.

Hillerman: That's right, that's right. It comes out in April.

C&I: Perfect. And we will get to that, but I'd love to start just because we haven't had an opportunity to talk to you in a while. I know obviously you grew up in a very literary home with your father, Tony Hillerman, and what was that like? Were there mountains of books everywhere? Were you always reading? What was your childhood like growing up like that?

Hillerman: Yeah, there were mountains of books everywhere and I was always reading. I was the eldest of six kids, so there also was plenty of chaos going around. Yeah, it was great. I was born in Oklahoma, but my dad got a job working for the paper in Santa Fe when I was, I think, between two and three. So we moved to New Mexico and I grew up pretty much in Santa Fe until I was about to start high school. And then dad got a job with UNM and we moved to Albuquerque. Both my parents were always very encouraging to me in terms of my writing, but even more than that, just in terms of being whatever I wanted to be, they were very convinced that I would be able to make my own decisions and find my own way. So they gave me guidance when I wanted, but they were sort of the opposite of helicopter parents. They were very trusting in me that I would do, and if I didn't do okay, I would figure out the way to go and fix it on my own or I mean, they were always willing to give me advice. 

But yeah, it was great and it was great to grow up in New Mexico. I mean, the landscape here is just so, I don't even know, inspiring, I guess that's the best word for it. And I love the mix of cultures and the histories. So yeah, it was great. The only thing I could complain about when I was, I think I was about five when my first sister was adopted, and I remember we went down to Albuquerque and mom and dad took me to the zoo. Well, at first we went by Catholic Social Services and we picked up this baby, and then the baby went with us to the zoo and she's a nice baby. Then we took her home and she stayed forever and well, gee, what happened? But for a writer, it was really wonderful to grow up with such a diverse family. I think I learned a lot about how to get along with people and how different things make different people tick. So I really, and also the charity in my parents' heart, the fact that they had had enough love to share with six kids. I mean, it was a wonderful example to me.

C&I: I'd read in a couple of interviews with you in the past that you spent a lot of time taking family trips in the station wagon, and I have to guess that a lot of that was for your dad's writing and obviously just their love of exploration. And what about having that innate knowledge of the Southwest really has l itself to you with continuing on the Leaphorn and Chee series?

Hillerman: Well, I think the biggest thing that helped me when I helped me decide that maybe I could continue the series was a nonfiction book that I did, been working on it before my father died, and it's called Tony Hillerman's Landscape: On the Road with Chee and Leaphorn. And my thought when I came up with that idea was dad would go with me and my late husband was a photographer, so he did pictures of the places that dad wrote about. And I thought, gee, maybe dad will be in the car with me. And when we're going to Tuba City or  Chinle or Window Rock Monument, that trip will stir some memories. And my dad had a million stories. I thought, what a gift it'll be to be in the car with him, just him and me and my husband Don, and listening to all these stories.

So I bounced that idea off my dad and he said he paused a while and he said, well, I really like my afternoon naps, and I've spent a lot of time bouncing around on the Navajo Nation. He said, why don't you and Don just go and then just show me the photos on the computer? And so that's what we did. But anyway, writing that book really gave me a wonderful feeling for the Navajo Nation and to do that book, I reread all of dad's 18 books that were set on the Navajo Nation. So the voices of Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn were really firmly in my head. So then when dad died, well, I went on a book tour for that book and I would show the pictures and talk about my dad, and people would always ask if Dad had another book, something in the pipeline, something almost ready to be released, something that would continue those stories and he didn't.

And I would have to say that. And then don't you just read the disappointment on the face of the person who'd asked that question? So after I heard that question maybe a hundred times, I thought, well, gee, besides missing my dad, I'm going to be missing these characters too. And even though I had never written a novel, I thought, what's the worst thing that could happen? I spend a year of my life or more trying to do this. I get a draft, I show it to my mom who was my dad's first and best editor, and mom doesn't like it. And so then I get it out of my system. But as things worked out, mom did like it and dad's editor liked it, and now I'm on my 10th book. So it's amazing how things work out.

C&I: That is, and I was going to ask too, I'm sure people maybe read your books and assume you've always just been involved, but you have your own writing career that progress from college and newspapers, radio newsrooms and magazines, and did you always feel like there was a plan or a progression in your mind for your career or just like mine, maybe things just kind of happen and you take the opportunity.

Hillerman: Yeah, I mean, it would've made so much sense to have had that kind of linear thinking. No, I was just kind of drifting along doing things that I loved. I mean, I always loved writing and I loved talking to people, and that was the wonderful thing about journalism. It gave me such a wonderful education after college in just all different kinds of things in politics and health and nature, and in human nature particularly, no, I didn't have a plan. Everybody who writes for a living somewhere in the back of your mind is the, maybe someday I'll write a novel. I didn't particularly have a plan that I would write a novel. But then after Dad died, I just thought, gosh, it's just a shame for these characters that I loved and that so many people loved to not be able to continue. And the other thing that really inspired me was the character of Bernadette Manuelito, and maybe we'll talk about that a little bit later.

C&I: And to just go back a second, talking about the Navajo Nation and the Southwest in general, I always find that the books I really connect with and that seem to be so popular are ones that are so rooted in a particular place. Have you found in the many, many book tours you've done with people who are from that area that they really connect with those books through the place that they already know and love?

Hillerman: Definitely. Interestingly, when I do tours outside of the Southwest, often people will come to those talks and they'll say, oh, I worked for public health in Chita for five years, and it was the best time of my life. And so when I read your books, it just reminds me of how much I loved being on the Navajo Nation and how much that southwestern scenery resonated with me. Yeah, I get that a lot. I think the states of Arizona and New Mexico should have given my dad the gold medal for increasing tourism and even increasing people who come to me and they'd say, I read your dad's books. So then we came out and we went to the Grand Canyon, and then we went to Santa Fe, and then we went to Buer, and then we thought, well, gee, this is really pretty nice. And then they moved to Arizona or New Mexico or Utah, wherever, places in the southwest that they might not have discovered without dad's books.

C&I: It always amazes me the impact of stories and books. I think that especially with these series that have endured for so long and even like yourself from one generation to the next, I know that almost every story has been told throughout history, we're all just replaying Hamlet or we're all replaying Don Quixote or something. And from your journalist background, I get from these stories, since they are often involving crime or real life issues and events, do you find a lot of inspiration in your early career that helps you now with these stories?

Hillerman: Oh, for sure, for sure. I've always been, well, ever since I started my career in journalism, and probably before that I was an avid newspaper reader. So often I'll read something in a newspaper online or maybe see something or hear something in a podcast, something that's happened in real, and then that will be a seed from which a story will grow or maybe a subplot or something. And the other thing that helped me in journalism, well, there were a couple of things: learning how to deal with editors, learning when you need to stand up for yourself and say, wait a minute, this is really important. Let me try rewriting this again, so you get it, or when you think, yeah, I can compromise on this point because this editor is pretty smart, learning that stuff. And I think learning deadlines, I mean, that's a lot of people I think who start to write a novel. They don't realize that if you get a contract, then you have to make the contract. You have to submit it by that time, and it ought to be as best as you can make it. So I think those two things really helped. Those things that I learned from journalism really carried over then when I became a fiction writer.

C&I: And do you often find that having carried this torch from one generation to the next with your dad, I'm sure there's benefits and I'm sure there's challenges. Can you talk for a second about maybe a couple of those and how you've faced those over the last 10 books?

Hillerman: Well, early in my career, my first challenge was my dad had created two strong male characters, Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn. And I realized if I was going to continue the series, I could never be Tony. So I had to think of something different, but something still very much in the spirit of those novels that he had created because I wanted to draw on all of the readers who loved his work just like I loved his work. So, look for me, dad had created the Bernadette Manuelito character, but he'd never really developed her in his books always. Sometimes she does better than other times, but mostly he's kind of stuck as the sweet young thing who brings Jim Chee his coffee and drives Jim around when he has a broken foot and is very much taken with her boss. And that was not the Bernie I wanted in my books.

The Bernie I wanted was the Bernie, who was a very competent police officer who could stand on her own pretty much with Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn. So anyway, that was one thing that I did to really make the series my own. And so in my first book, Spider Woman's Daughter, I thought, I'm not a good enough writer to be able to juggle Leaphorn, Chee, and Bernadette Manuelito. So I'm going to have to figure out something to do here. And also, I have to think of something pretty dramatic to get reader's attention. As you know, a lot of skepticism when there's a beloved series and then the author dies, and then some newcomer decides, oh, I am going to write this series now. So I was really expecting that from dad's fans. I thought maybe they'll give me five or six pages. And so I thought, I don't have long to get their attention. I came up with something dramatic. I don't want to say what it is in case there are people who haven't read my books yet, but something dramatic to kind of move Joe Leaphorn away from Center Stage, although he still is very much in that first book. And to give Bernie Manuelito a chance to and rise as a crime solver and figure it out what to do and how to get to the bottom of things.

And a lot of readers were very upset, wouldn't believe what happened to poor Joe. And I had to reassure them at the end of that book, his fate is still unserved. So I would reassure them, no, no, I would be pretty dumb to get rid of a guy who you all have loved for 18 books, so just bear with me. It's going to be okay. And then it took Joe a while to return full force, and by the time, I think that was my fifth book, and by that time I felt like I had enough experience under my belt that then I could juggle all three characters.

C&I: That's great. And you mentioned a part there with the Bernie character that you needed to insert someone who could stand on their own, this strong female character. And in a way, do you find parallels in your own chance to then stand on your own with that first book and then later on with the subsequent novels and find a connection Bernie and yourself through that character?

Hillerman: Yeah, for sure. For sure. It was like raising her up also raised me up from being a journalist and writing nonfiction. But as you know, most people don't read nonfiction books. I mean, in terms of actually making a living as a writer, it was much better for me to move on to fiction. So yeah, I give Bernie a lot of thanks for encouraging me to stand up for myself and move on to the next phase in my career.

C&I: Well, and just as in one bygone era, I think female characters were probably underrepresented. The same could be said about indigenous characters and fiction. And your dad did such a great job of bringing that to the forefront, and you've continued that and to see the real world issues facing these peoples and how they handle it, and how unique their responses to these challenges. Have you felt a sense of duty in that way? And how has that community reacted to that?

Hillerman: I have felt a sense of duty. My dad's whole premise, how can I say it, to crush the stereotype of poor, drunken, uneducated, et cetera, et cetera. Indians. I mean, in his books, Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn are the heroes. And so that was certainly the theme that has gone through in all of my books. And both dad and I did deal with some social issues. We deal with poverty, we deal with addiction problems, but mostly both our books are full of optimism in terms of the Navajo people's ability to overcome these problems because of the strength of their own culture and their family ties and their real connectedness to their communities. In my book, that's just coming out, Shadow of the Solstice. I deal with two with one particularly big social issue, which is the problem of addiction. And that book concerns fake sober homes that were going on in Tucson that would send white vans throughout Indian country, and they would basically offer, if they would see homeless people, people down and out, they would offer them treatment to overcome addiction and room and shelter, I mean room and food besides the therapy.

So a lot of these people would take them up on it. And then when they got to Phoenix, the whole thing was a scam and they were abandoned. So I wanted to tell that story in my new book, but I wanted it to have a happier ending than a lot of those stories had. So I think thanks to the character of Bernadette Manto and thanks to my dad's just the enduring energy that still comes to me from my dad's stories, I was able to think of a way that at least the characters in my book could have a happier resolution to that story.

C&I: And I think that Dark Winds, the television show, which we'll get to in just a second, on which the series is based, is on the cover of our latest issue. And we've had such a great response from the indigenous community just to see, and to put it bluntly, faces that look like them in these prominent roles, in these prominent areas and television and books. And you talked for a second about that you do have this sense of duty, and having not been from that nation or the other subsequent indigenous nations of that area, how do you go about making sure that the characters have this innate authenticity to them? Is there a lot of research that goes into that, or what does that look like to you as a writer?

Hillerman: Yeah, I do a lot of research, and then I have Navajo friends and non Navajo friends who've worked a lot with the Navajos who give me some good guidance if I feel like I'm maybe dealing in an area where there could be some issues in my book that's coming out. There's a child in that book, and I wanted to give him a nickname. So because of the way he looks, I thought maybe I'll call him there. But then it dawned on me, I had never run into a Navajo child with that nickname. So I asked one of my friends who worked in Chinle, and she said, I don't think you should do that. So then I asked another Navajo friend and he said, I don't think so, but let me ask around. And then he asked around and he got back to me and he said, no, don't use that name. Because if a mother or father were calling their child and they used that name, the other thing they could be doing would be calling a bear to come to their house. I thought, oh yeah, that's a very good reason for not using that name. So instead I called that boy Sam. Subtle things like that that can get me in trouble or can get anybody in trouble.

C&I: Well, it always amazes me whenever I talk to authors of your stature, how much a community really puts into these books. The writer does the writing, but it's the friends, it's the community connections that really help flesh these stories out and bring characters to life. And I can only imagine the countless people of your father's books that went into helping him build out these characters. And I'm sure in a way, like you said, you went back and read your father's books before you started Jim Leaphorn, and she were probably like your guides to their world and to their nation. And how pivotal was it to have that source material to go off of?

Hillerman: Oh, it was vital. It was absolutely vital, particularly in the beginning. I know people would come up to me for my first few books and they'd say, gee, I can't tell the difference between your work and your writing and your father's writing. And I think some of that was because his voice and the voice which he gave those characters was so strongly in my head having just read all those books. But the other thing, going back to one of your early questions was our background in journalism.

I think as a journalist, you learn to get to the point to write short sentences to use a lot of verbs, and that really brings writing to life. And that was true for dad's books. And I think it's true for my, now that I have a little more confidence, I little more, I think there is more of a difference in our two voices.

C&I: Were you ever, I'm sure in those early years, like you said, the last thing you wanted to do is anger fans of this long running series, and was there a point where you felt like, I don't think dad would've written that, but I'm okay with that. Was there ever a point like that for you?

Hillerman: Yeah, I think it was in my first book. I have Bernie Manuelito coming home after a long day, and Jim Chee is dad had them married in his last book, so I didn't have to deal with boyfriends, any of that stuff, or girlfriends for Jim. So anyway, Bernie comes home and Jim is cooking, and I think dad maybe had him opening a can of spam or something, but never had him cooking food. He likes to cook and they're talking, or, anyway, she starts kind of talking about her day and he says, wait a minute. And he gives her a kiss. And I think that is the first kiss in any of the Hillerman novels. So that's rather proud of myself. Anyway, a woman's touch. And the other thing, a fan told me this, and I to say I was kind of tickled about it, he said, well, Ms. Hillerman, I like your books, but I have to say you have turned Jim Chee into the perfect husband. She said it with such disdain. I thought, well, maybe I did, but somewhat.

C&I: Well, you've opened up it to a much wider audience in that way, maybe. So let's jump for a second into the AMC series Dark Winds, which Season three premieres and I think two days, and then already approved for another season, the fourth season. And can you talk to me about when did you first get involved and how involved were you in the early stages of that?

Hillerman: I first got involved when I got, I think it was a lawyer who worked for Robert Redford and George RR Martin, saying that they were considering doing something, and my dad had signed a contract years ago with Robert Redford, but this was something different. And so at that point, I was the literary trustee of the Tony Hillerman books, and they wanted me to sign a contract as trustee, giving them the right to use those books for any movie or television series, whatever might come from it. And they also asked for the rights to my first four books. So that was my first involvement, and because of that, they named me executive producer, but I didn't have much else really to do with it, except I got invited to watch a few of the filming’s, and I got invited to go to the premier of the very first season. And I've done a fine job. I am particularly happy with the way they have used my vision of the character of Bernadette Manuelito. They have really moved her from the sweet but incompetent law enforcement person that dad created into somebody who really stands on her own and has a brain and has a backbone. So yeah, I love the way that Jessica Matten is playing that character. Of course, Zahn McClarnon and Kiowa Gordon too. I think they're all doing a really fine job.

C&I: You've been around these books for so long, almost your entire life. And when you first met Zahn and Kiowa and Jessica, was it odd to see these characters come to life in that way?

Hillerman: Yeah, for sure it was. And I had seen the first movies that Robert Redford did where he had Wes Studi as Leaphorn and Adam Beach as the Jim Chee character, and there was no Bernie Manuelito in those movies. So, in my mind is the way I see them. And then there's the Wes Studi version, and then there's the Zahn version, and they're really so different. They're all great.

And somebody, they script writers basically have used Dad's books and my Bernie as inspiration for the series. They don't follow any of dad's stories exactly. And readers who feel like those stories are the Bible, they get a little bit bristly about that, and they write me letters and they say, "well, wait a minute, Jim Chee never worked for the FBI," and how dare they, and, "Joe Leaphorn never had a son who was killed, and Emma should be long dead by now," and all of that stuff. And all I can say is books are still the books, everything you loved about the books is still there exactly as you remember it different and just go with it. I think that love Dark Winds, I think they're doing a good, good job.

C&I: And you must, as a writer especially, and a trustee really of your dad's legacy, love the dedication that the fans have, they feel so empowered to step up and to help defend what they love so much.

Hillerman: Yeah, I do. I really love that. I love that passion, but I just have to remind them, the books are still good. The books are still as you remember them, don't get upset. You don't have to watch it just, but I think Dark Winds is great, and I really encourage people to watch it.

Well, and one thing, oh, I want to say too, I was so pleased that they made such an effort to use native writers and to have as many native people as possible, both on the camera and behind the camera. I give them tremendous credit for that.

C&I: That's great. Yeah, and you read my mind. Exactly. That was my next question from Zahn and even producers and everyone behind the cast and crew really bringing authenticity to these roles and from our interactions with them, Zahn's been on our cover before, and they are this month. In fact, you remember, I'm sure when your dad first started writing these stories, just how different our world was and how things have changed in the many years since. And do you think your dad could have ever imagined that his characters would be on the cover of magazines at one point?

Hillerman: Yeah, I think he probably could have actually, because when he wrote his first book, it came out in 1970, and then he was just a regional author. He was still teaching full-time at the university. This was kind of a sideline, and I think it took seven or eight books before he was able to make the switch to actually making a living as an author. Then after that, I mean, Harper Collins would send a limousine to pick him up at the house, and they flew him everywhere and got him an escort to take him from the hotel to wherever he was doing his interviews. I mean, he was like a celebrity author for a few years. So yeah, I don't think he would be surprised, but I think he'd be really pleased. He would be especially pleased about all of the new indigenous voices that are coming up now. He taught for so long, he taught journalism, and then he taught creative writing, and after that, he worked a lot as a mentor with beginning writers, and I think it would just make his heart sing to see how so many people who have such talent are really getting more attention now than they would've gotten back in 1970.

C&I: Well, I've saved the last best questions for last, and they're about shadow the Solstice, which comes out in April and not too much longer for your fans to wait, and it's the 10th book. It's a milestone for any author. And tell us how this process worked out for you with Shadow of the Solstice, and how have you tackled the challenge of keeping these stories fresh? 10 books in?

Hillerman: It hasn't been much of a challenge for me. I hope my fans would agree, would agree with that statement. Always. There's so much crime, there's so many just bizarre things that happen in the world. And also when you're writing a series besides having the big plots, you have all of the oh kind of foundation where you have a marriage that's developing. I have minor characters whose lives are getting more complicated. This, I mean, I think when my dad wrote the series, he was more of the straight police procedural guy.

It was like Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn, and Jim had a few girlfriends and Joe's wife died. But basically, most of the plot was now we wait for these results, and then we find this clue and things were kind of trotting along that way. Whereas in my books, things are trotting along, but then also there's this whole undercurrent of what's happening to Bernie's sister who was having a drinking problem. Has she taken care of that? And she was going to be an artist, and now she's working in Shadow of the Solstice. She's working as a home health aide and decided she's going to be a nurse. So I have really more than enough to keep me busy and to fill up those pages. One that always foreshadow the salsas, like I mentioned, that terrible Medicaid scam that was exploiting native people. I just thought they have to write about this.

This is just so intense. And so it's a crime that in real life, the Navajo police stepped in to help with. And I love to call attention to, like I said earlier, to the fact that so many stereotypes are just totally wrong, and this was the Navajo police stepping in where mainstream law enforcement was kind of lackadaisical about it. So anyway, I love that story, and that inspired Jim Chee and Bernie Manuelito to do something there. And then the other story has to do with the legacy of uranium mining on the Navajo Nation, and what inspired it was the mine on the south side of the Grand Canyon and uranium from that mine. Then it had to roll through the Navajo Nation to get to the mill in Utah. And the Navajo nation was very much against this, but they couldn't block the road because it was a main highway.

But eventually there was enough protests that they got the uranium country to come up with some good concessions, which included helping clean up some of the bad uranium sites that have been on the Navajo nation for a long time. So that got me thinking about uranium and its legacy and the whole movement about climate change. And anyway, it's like you start with one idea and then it kind of goes in a circle. And next thing I knew, I had kind of a cult that wanted to come to the Navajo Nation to celebrate the solstice, and things just kept moving. Anyway, it was quite an interesting book. I think it was a little more complicated than the other novels I've written. And yeah, it gave me a challenge, but I was glad to get it wrapped up, and I really hope readers will like it, because I like the way it ends.

C&I: Do you ever find, and especially with this book being so, like you said, complicated with a lot of different ideas and issues that the characters are wrestling with, that the more you throw on your characters, then you say, oh, man, now I have to wrestle how to flesh this out and wrap this up with a bow so that readers will be, how do you manage that and find a good balance for yourself as a writer?

Hillerman: Well, one thing, it was an interesting book in many ways besides just the writing challenges. My editor at Harper Collins had a stroke, and so she was basically, I mean, she did the best she could, but she was not able to be a lot of help on this book. But luckily for me, they hired a freelance editor who knew a lot about the Navajo Nation. She had grown up from the Navajo Nation, they had worked with her before, and she was brilliant. She really was a huge help to me in terms of little details that would've made things seem crossways. The other thing that happened, I did some of my writing on this in Santa Fe, and while I was there, my house there is out of town. While I was there, our well went out. So we had to move to a new place, my husband and I, and our dogs, and figure all of that out.

And then the batteries that ran, our solar system started to die. So we had to deal with all of that, and if we're off the grid, so all of our electricity was either solar from a generator, so it was a little more stress than I was normally used to. But there's something about, I think my years in journalism where you're working on deadline and then all of a sudden something else happens and the deadline gets tighter and the information gets more complex. I think all of that kind of helped me in this book. So in the end, it was like a marathon, but proud of it, and readers like it too.

C&I: A nice long rest after though, I'm sure, but I don't, well, yeah, not too long though, because from your event calendar on your website, you are packed already for March and April and on into the summertime, and how much fun is it for you to get out and to talk about the books

Hillerman: It really recharges my battery. Writing novels is such a weird life because, for me to really focus on it, I just have to be sitting in my office with my dog. I'll get up and go for a walk, but I'm not very social while I'm in the midst of writing. So then when I'm down, it's like all of a sudden I get to go out and play with my friends and talk to people who share the same interest I do in books and words and stories, and it's really, really good. And it's exhausting too, but love it. I love it. It's nice to know that all that good work pays off and that people are reading, right? That's the important thing. And sometimes people have really good questions or they'll say, well, I liked such and such a character, but I was kind of disappointed that you just left him hanging. And I think, oh, yeah, I did. Well, maybe in the next book I can take care of that.

Tony Hillerman holding an infant Anne

C&I: And you've also got, as far as events coming up, you've got a big keynote address for your dad in Shawnee, Oklahoma, and I know that important place for him and it, it's his centennial birthday, if I'm not mistaken, so a big event. And how important is it still 10 books in to honor the legacy that he left behind for you?

Hillerman: Oh, it's crucial. It's crucial. I would not be who I am without my dad, without my mom either. I mean, my mom was a big, big reader, and like I said earlier, my mom was my first editor. So yeah, that legacy is really important to me. I was so honored that the state of Oklahoma decided to do this for my dad, and I've been thinking, what can I say that people don't already know? So I'm going to talk about what it was like to grow up with Tony Hillerman as a dad, both as a young person, and then when I was in my own career, how his example and his words of advice really, really helped me and maybe share a few tips that he gave me that had to do not only with writing, but how to live your life in general. 

C&I: When you're not writing and touring and visiting sets of shows and doing all that, where can you be found? What are some of your other favorite things to do?

Hillerman: Oh, I am with this cooking group, and they've set up a demonstration for us on how to do rack of lamb. One of the members has a husband who's a professional chef. He's going to give us a lesson in that. So yeah, I love to cook and I love to read, and I never mean, a lot of the reading I do now is for research. So when I'm not working on a book, I love to read stuff that's just for fun. And I'd like to walk with my dogs where I live in Santa Fe near the Ortiz Mountains, and there's wonderful, wonderful places where I could just walk forever. And the dogs don't have to worry about cars. They can be off leash And in Tucson, I live near the Saguaro National Monument East, and there are great trails that go there among the Saguaros, and it's really interesting to be in two very different environments. So yeah, there's a lot to do. I need to add an extra day in the week.

C&I: Well, Ms. Hillerman, thank you so much for your time.