Quick Fall Of Light
www.quickfalloflight.com
A woman and an incredible bird survive
a modern-day pandemic and a corporate
hitman in this riveting eco-thriller.
Winner of ForeWord Reviews Book
of the Year 2010 "Silver Award" for
Science Fiction.
Ideas for this book began almost like a
snowstorm—snowflakes, like ideas, some
solitary, others conjoined. First, I wanted
to do a story set in the Olympic Rain Forest
of Washington State. There needed to be a
strong sense of impending doom, but not
full-blown apocalypse. An epidemic,
maybe. Through all the warnings, all the
waiting, it would approach. Not as one
would think of an outbreak of monumental
proportions, but as a trickle, building
steam.
At the same time, I was fascinated with the
long-ago effects of the 1918 flu. As a
medical transcriptionist, I’ve documented
the course of disease through hundreds of
lives. But it wasn’t until I realized my
grandmother’s lifelong problems with
diabetes, digestive problems, and
unexplainable lethargy that I found out
she suffered and survived the flu of 1918.
In fact, her illness brought my grandfather
home from World War I. This was the
second major element that brought me to
the story.
A third element was the love of flight. In
my early 20s I learned to fly single engine
planes, finally accumulating a few
hundred hours of flight time. Though
flying never became anything more than
recreational, rare encounters with birds
did happen. Fortunately, these were
always incidental, but lasting. I realized I
was in their space and sharing their world.
When it finally occurred to me that the
passenger pigeon became extinct at almost
the same time my grandmother might’ve
died from the greatest influenza of all
time, I began to work a plot around the
idea of retrieving a bird from extinction
and pushing it for an anti-virus to stem a
new and lethal virus—a modern-day
influenza. And with that, the story of
Quick Fall of Light was born.
"A profound, and profoundly affecting novel. I
don't think anybody could read it without being
deeply touched. I was. I found it hard to
resist--the ideas, the writing, the passion, the
message. All resonated for me. A wonderful
reading experience. . . I think anyone who picks
up this book will be changed by it."
--Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, Ph.D., Author of
When Elephants Weep and Dogs Never Lie About
Love
*******
"This book has everything! Great characters,
vivid language, a shocking resurrection, and
birds. I loved it!"
--Sy Montgomery, Author of Birdology
*******
"Sherrida Woodley bravely takes on the big
issues between humans and the natural world:
evolution, extinction, human hubris,
technological arrogance and ecological survival.
Quick Fall of Light shares Rachel Carson's fears
for our planet and exhibits Woodley's own
"sense of wonder," as well as her sure instincts
for mystery and suspense. Nature lovers have a
new advocate."
--Linda Lear, Historian/Biographer and Author of
Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature
*******
"This is the riveting story of a possible plague
and the haunting loss of the passenger pigeon.
Woodley explores a future world of global
extinctions and how we might survive a
pandemic of bird flu. A prophetic mystery and
an environmental thriller, Quick Fall of Light
will keep you reading and wondering."
--Brenda Peterson, Author of Animal Heart
*******
"Quick Fall of Light is an extraordinary debut
novel -- an eco-thriller with a strong narrative
urgency coupled with lyrical prose. Sometimes a
great book takes years to bubble to the surface.
In Ms. Woodley's case, it was certainly worth the
wait."
--Andrew Blechman, Author of Pigeons: The
Fascinating Saga of the World's most Revered
and Reviled Birds
*******
"A suspenseful tale of a near-future virus, Quick
Fall of Light is a unique contribution to the
literature of extinction: a science fiction novel
about passenger pigeons. Readers interested in
the genre and those interested in birds should
pick this book up."
--Christopher Cokinos, Author of Hope Is the
Thing with Feathers: A Personal Chronicle of
Vanished Birds
*******
"You have never read anything like Sherrida
Woodley's Quick Fall of Light, a unique
bio-thriller that goes far beyond Michael
Crichton's territory. Fall connects the extinction
of the passenger pigeon, the deadly flu of 1918,
and the perhaps inevitable pandemic of the
future in a fast-paced story that is unique,
informed, terrifying, and finally hopeful, racing
along at times like a forest fire or a great flock
of birds."
--Stephen J. Bodio, Author of Querencia and
Eagle Dreams
*******
"Quick Fall of Light is a powerful archetypal tale
that bores deeply into bone and blood. It is an
important message for our age, because it
connects us with the mysterious essence of the
natural world, a connection we require now
more than ever."
--Larry Dossey, M.D., Author of The Power of
Premonitions