The Memoir Land Author Questionnaire #62: Manjula Martin
"I usually say that The Last Fire Season is a book about wildfire, but it’s also about living in a body on this planet, right now."
Since 2010, in various publications, I’ve interviewed authors—mostly memoirists—about aspects of writing and publishing. Initially I did this for my own edification, as someone who was struggling to find the courage and support to write and publish my memoir. I’m still curious about other authors’ experiences, and I know many of you are, too. So, inspired by the popularity of The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire, I’ve launched The Memoir Land Author Questionnaire.
Here’s the 62nd installment, featuring Manjula Martin, author, most recently of The Last Fire Season: A Personal and Pyronatural History. -Sari Botton
Manjula Martin is author of The Last Fire Season: A Personal and Pyronatural History. She is coauthor of Fruit Trees for Every Garden, which won the American Horticultural Society Book Award. Martin edited the anthology Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living, and from 2016 to 2020 she was managing editor of the National Magazine Award–winning literary journal Zoetrope: All-Story. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, Virginia Quarterly Review, and other publications. She lives in California.
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How old are you, and for how long have you been writing?
I’m 48, and I began writing for publication in the 1990s, with some breaks between then and now. I learned to write by reading, and my parents—my mom, dad, and stepmom, each in their own way—were strong influences on my literary development, as was the zine movement and poetry.
What’s the title of your latest book, and when was it published?
The Last Fire Season: A Personal and Pyronatural History was published in January of 2024; the paperback comes out this May, 2025.
What number book is this for you?
This is book number three, but it’s the first book I’ve published that is not a collaboration. This one’s allll me. I previously cowrote a gardening book with my dad, and I edited an anthology of essays and interviews called Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living (based on the much-loved and short-lived magazine of the same name that I founded). (Editor’s note: I have an essay in Scratch!)
How do you categorize your book—as a memoir, memoir-in-essays, essay collection, creative nonfiction, graphic memoir, autofiction—and why?
I’d like to quote Rita Bullwinkel here and say, “Genre is a lie.” That said, I usually call my book a nature memoir, and I’m always happy when I see it in a bookstore displayed among other narrative books about the more-than-human world.
The narrative follows the 2020 wildfire season in Northern California, where I live, and my concurrent experience of chronic pain, which was the result of a reproductive health crisis. Along the way we make pit stops for natural and sociopolitical history, the ages-old love affair between humans and fire, popular concepts of “the apocalypse”, and my rose garden. It’s a genre-defying memoir about fire, pain, beauty, and the power of loving the land during an era of ecological crisis.
What is the “elevator pitch” for your book?
The Hollywood pitch is: H is for Hawk meets Joan Didion in the Pyrocene. Given a few more floors for the elevator ride, I usually say that The Last Fire Season is a book about wildfire, but it’s also about living in a body on this planet, right now. Structurally, the book weaves together memoir, literary inquiry, and environmental history and reportage. The narrative follows the 2020 wildfire season in Northern California, where I live, and my concurrent experience of chronic pain, which was the result of a reproductive health crisis. Along the way we make pit stops for natural and sociopolitical history, the ages-old love affair between humans and fire, popular concepts of “the apocalypse”, and my rose garden. It’s a genre-defying memoir about fire, pain, beauty, and the power of loving the land during an era of ecological crisis.
What’s the back story of this book including your origin story as a writer? How did you become a writer, and how did this book come to be?
This question is probably best answered by reading my memoir, haha! But I will say, I was working on a novel when I had the idea for this book. At first I thought it could be an essay, and when I realized it was a book, I knew I had to write it before I wrote anything else. It was urgent, and I was lucky that my agent and publisher agreed.
What were the hardest aspects of writing this book and getting it published?
After I sold the book, I knew I wanted to write it quickly. For one, some of the experiences in the book – evacuating from a fire, medical trauma, the entirety of the year 2020 – were not ones I wanted to live inside of in my head for too long. I didn’t know if I could survive spending many more years in that headspace. I also knew I needed to live off my book advance while I was writing it – it wasn’t the kind of project I could do (or do well) with a day job. So I set myself a rigorous and at times punitive work schedule. I basically wrote it in a year. The two things that helped me do that were having a confined timeframe to the main storyline, having a clear structure for the braided aspects of the story. I work well with deadlines and constraints. Otherwise, it’s too easy to get lost in deep research, or to drown in memories.
In terms of publishing, my imprint (Pantheon) was pretty damn great, tbh. I think the most difficult thing about promoting the book since its publication has been that it seems to me the media environment right now is mostly interested in simple answers, whereas my book asks a lot of complicated questions. But op eds, servicey tips, and clickbait are very much the abiding vibe in the culture in this country right now. So to come out with—and to pitch—a book that interweaves genres, that asks more questions than it answers, and which is long and thoughtful and deeply felt and researched, in this media environment and at this sociopolitical moment… well, it’s challenging to sell nuance and complexity in a binary market! It’s challenging to sell books, period.
How did you handle writing about real people in your life? Did you use real or changed names and identifying details? Did you run passages or the whole book by people who appear in the narrative? Did you make changes they requested?
I have a policy about this, which is to fact-check scenes and stories that deeply involve other people, but never to let them read the actual text. Not everyone knows how to give editorial feedback, and honestly I just didn’t have time to let everyone read their parts. I didn’t even let my partner read it until it was about to go into production, and he’s basically the hero of the book! There were a couple scenes in the book that I significantly reworked after fact-checking them with the characters who appear. I reworked those parts not because I got them wrong or anyone asked me to, but because memory is a slippery beast and that is the nature – and beauty – of memoirs. And if I described people using certain identity markers, I would also run those by the person. I’d explain they’re mentioned in my memoir and I’d just ask them, like asking a person’s pronoun or age—e.g., “Would it be accurate to describe you as a person who identifies as Latine, or Latino?”
For names, I set up a house style: I used first names of people I know personally. For people who I interviewed or experts who appear as characters in reported chapters, I used their first and last name. There was one person I asked if she wanted to use a pseudonym because she has a job that involves an ethic of privacy, but she was fine with using her real name.
Who is another writer you took inspiration from in producing this book? Was it a specific book, or their whole body of work? (Can be more than one writer or book.)
The writers who most inspired me during the making of this book are other writers I know who are working in similar (and sometimes dissimilar!) topical areas, some of whom don’t have books out yet but each of whom are fucking brilliant and strong and generous writers and humans: Rahawa Haile, Sarah McCarry, Colin Dickey, Sasha Wright, Latria Graham, Tessa Hulls, Lauren Markham, Lydia Kiesling, M.R. O’Connor, Ed Yong, to name just a handful.
There were a couple scenes in the book that I significantly reworked after fact-checking them with the characters who appear. I reworked those parts not because I got them wrong or anyone asked me to, but because memory is a slippery beast and that is the nature – and beauty – of memoirs. And if I described people using certain identity markers, I would also run those by the person. I’d explain they’re mentioned in my memoir and I’d just ask them, like asking a person’s pronoun or age…
What advice would you give to aspiring writers looking to publish a book like yours, who are maybe afraid, or intimidated by the process?
The first advice I would give an aspiring memoirist is: You actually don’t have to do this. I think there’s an expectation that in order to be published or stay relevant, nonfiction writers must perform their trauma—their deepest, most painful experiences. I don’t want to perpetuate that. I wrote a memoir that involved painful experiences in my past and my present, but I did so because I knew I had the resources—money, space, relationships—that would allow me to come out the other side unharmed. There are scenes in this book that still make my brain and body stop working when I read them back. I call them the thick scenes. Like molasses. They’re slower to write and almost impossible for me to read. I only decided to write about them because I knew I was ready. And because these events were part of a larger story I felt driven to tell. That story includes a lot of awesomeness and joy and beauty, as well as the thick parts.
Pain isn’t the only way to get attention as an artist, and I just think it’s important to remind people of that. You don’t have to do the trauma porn thing. You can write whatever you fucking want.
And writing isn’t therapy, so make sure you do both.
What do you love about writing?
I love absolutely everything writing. It’s seriously the best job. The. Best.
In terms of the day-to-day, I think revising is an undersung hero of the writing process. That’s the real work, and I’m really glad that I happen to enjoy it. I’ve also worked as an editor, and I take great pleasure in managing the give-and-take between those two parts of my brain: writer and editor.
What frustrates you about writing?
To write a book-length work requires tremendous, intense, sustained focus and attention. In order to focus as intently as I need to, I often go into a dirtbag state when in the midst of intense writing. It’s not healthy to not eat, or forget to get up and go to the bathroom, or to be so brain-tired at the end of a writing day that I can’t answer a simple yes or no question about dinner or what show to watch. My partner calls this “book brain” and it probably frustrates him more than it does me.
What about writing surprises you?
How fun it is, when you’re really working.
Does your writing practice involve any kind of routine or writing at specific times?
I don’t have kids, and I was able to make this book my fulltime job for a year, so during that time I was able to keep a schedule that emulated the 9-to-5 paradigm. For me, the writing itself is the ritual. But the ritual is best done first thing in the morning, as soon as possible after I wake up, as close to the dream-state as I can get while still drinking caffeinated tea.
The first advice I would give an aspiring memoirist is: You actually don’t have to do this. I think there’s an expectation that in order to be published or stay relevant, nonfiction writers must perform their trauma—their deepest, most painful experiences. I don’t want to perpetuate that. I wrote a memoir that involved painful experiences in my past and my present, but I did so because I knew I had the resources—money, space, relationships—that would allow me to come out the other side unharmed.
Do you engage in any other creative pursuits, professionally or for fun? Are there non-writing activities do you consider to be “writing” or supportive of your process?
Walking is writing, and reading is writing. I can’t write without also doing both those things.
I also have a hobby: Roller-skating, which is not writing, but it is pure joy, and it’s good to have regular doses of joy when you’re daily plumbing the depths of your own psyche.
What’s next for you? Do you have another book planned, or in the works?
I’m working on a novel. I meant to be a novelist this whole time, but apparently I’ve published three nonfiction books and edited magazines instead. Oops.
"Walking is writing, and reading is writing." Yes!! I get some of my best writing ideas while walking or after reading a good book.