Nina Munteanu Reads on “Sample Chapter Podcast”

December 30, 2020November 24, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

I recently appeared on Episode #142 of award-winning “Sample Chapter Podcast” where I had a wonderful interview with Jason Meuschke and read a sample chapter from my recent eco-novel “A Diary in the Age of Water.”

Jason and I talked about the writing process; what makes good and compelling fiction; creating realistic and interesting characters with flaws–like my flawed detective Rhea Hawke in The Splintered Universe Trilogy‘ writing eco-fiction in which environment can be a character; the “what ifs” in historical fiction and where we get our ideas (The Last Summoner came to me in a dream and later through a single image).

This is what Jason said about Episode 142 of The Sample Chapter Podcast with Nina Munteanu:

Episode 142 is here with a truly delightful author from Canada, Nina Munteanu. In the episode, Nina and Jason discuss character flaws, having the environment be a character in our prose, the “what ifs” in historical fiction, the writer’s “wavelengths”, and much more all before enjoying a magical chapter reading. Enjoy!

Here’s the podcast:

*First snow in Thompson Creek marsh, ON (photo by Nina Munteanu)*

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press(Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times ‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” was released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.

“A Diary in the Age of Water” Reviewed by Kirkus Reviews, The Winnipeg Free Press and The Miramichi Reader

December 20, 2020November 2, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

Nina Munteanu’s cli-fi eco-novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” just released in summer of 2020 received several favourable reviews from Kirkus Reviews, The Winnipeg Free Press, and The Miramichi Reader. The speculative novel about four generations of woman and their unique relationship with water was recently awarded the Literary Titan Award for a book that “expertly delivers complex characters, intricate worlds, and thought provoking themes. The ease with which the story is told is a reflection of the author’s talent in exercising fluent, powerful, and appropriate language.”

“While bringing attention to the current politicization of climate change, the story maintains important underlying themes like family, love, forgiveness, and the complexity of the human soul. The author has gone to great lengths to show that there are different layers to each character, none fully evil nor fully good. A Diary in the Age of Water is an exceptional and thought-provoking dystopian fiction.”
—LITERARY TITAN (4-star)

“In Canadian ecologist Munteanu’s novel, a child in a world of climate disaster discovers hidden truths about the past in a mysterious journal. In a story set centuries in the future, a young girl with four arms named Kyo lives on the last vestige of a planet damaged by climate crisis, water scarcity, and a cataclysm brought on by semi-divine figures called the Water Twins. Kyo comes across the 21st-century journal of a limnologist named Lynna; over two decades, the journal’s author details Earth’s fate with scientific observations on the harm wrought by corporate greed, as well as her own personal struggles raising a child in a world of catastrophe and authoritarianism. She’s a deeply relatable and tragically flawed character who’s wracked by doubt, fear, and cynicism—a stark contrast to her fierce environmentalist mother, Una, and her spiritual, idealistic daughter, Hildegard. What unites them all is the study of water: its intrinsic properties, its mysteries, and ultimately its necessity to the planet. In poetic prose (“We’re going down in a kind of slow violence”) with sober factual basis, Munteanu transmutes a harrowing dystopia into a transcendentalist origin myth…the author asks uncomfortable questions and explores the effects of one generation’s actions upon the next as they ripple outward like a stone dropped in a pond. A sobering and original cautionary tale that combines a family drama with an environmental treatise.”
—KIRKUS REVIEWS

“Futuristic novel awash with water warnings”

“An engaging epistolary novel. An ecologist and environmental activist herself, Munteanu has no difficulty voicing a fully formed literary character who is both scientifically literate enough to understand how quickly human society is entering its final ebb, and humane enough to mourn the fullness of this tragedy.
The prose here is beautiful and purposeful in the tradition of environmentally and socially minded novelists such as Ursula K. Le Guin and Margaret Atwood… It comes down to water: ice sheets, rain and drought, the loss of water tables and the collapse of marine ecologies in an acidifying ocean. The pulse and rhythm of life on this planet is water. Its death throes, too, can be read in the flow of water.
Munteanu has produced something which joins George Orwell and Aldous Huxley, Le Guin and Atwood, a warning of the direction we are heading that will be valuable even if we manage to avert disaster.”
—Joel Boyce, WINNIPEG FREE PRESS

“A Diary in the Age of Water commands reader interest on a number of levels…a chilling but believable portrayal of what might happen as fresh water becomes scarcer… Munteanu’s novel provides a cautionary note for what might happen if we fail to pay attention to this precious resource.”
—Lisa Timpf, MIRAMICHI READER

Short Synopsis

A Diary in the Age of Water follows the climate-induced journey of the Earth and humanity through four generations of women, each with a unique relationship to her world and to water. Water plays both metaphoric and literal roles in this allegorical tale of humanity’s final journey from home—where male sterility, heat-shock proteins, horizontal gene transfer, and virgin-births rule a changing world of water securitization through ambitious environmental manipulation (e.g., resurrecting the US Army Corps of Engineers 1960s NAWAPA/CeNAWP plan to create the 800 km long Rocky Mountain Trench reservoir and divert most of northern Canada’s water to the USA—drowning a fifth of BC).

Told in far-future and near-future frames, the central part of the story is a diary by a limnologist, whose personal account creates a terrifying realism to the geo-political tension of water securitization, plague containment, and police oppression—the diary spans from 2045 to 2064 (when the diarist disappears herself).

The cli-fi novel begins centuries from now in the dying northern boreal forest with young KYO, a blue water nymph with multiple arms who dreams of the past and of being a normal human. She is on her way to the library to memorize a textbook on the Age of Water and there discovers a piece of her past from that age when The Water Twins destroyed the world. Kyo discovers a diary by a limnologist (who happens to be the mother of one of the Twins). Intrigued, Kyo drops the textbook and reads the diary. The diary, by cynical limnologist LYNNA, describes a near-future Toronto in the grips of severe water scarcity. The gritty memoir describes Toronto in a time when China owns the USA and the USA owns Canada, and aggressively mines its water. While lamenting the greed and destructive nature of her race, Lynna self-servingly helps murder three people; she also gives birth to rebel daughter HILDA (one of the Water Twins) who destroys her world through water and gives virgin-birth to the next stage in human evolution: a mutant who becomes one of the Disappeared who returns centuries later in a dying world as the water keeper Kyo.

“A Diary in the Age of Water” explores identity and our concept of what is “normal”—as a nation and an individual—in a world that is rapidly and incomprehensibly changing.

*Poplar trees in northern Ontario in fall (photograph by Nina Munteanu*

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press (Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times ‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” was released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.

Twelve Books on Climate and Environment for the Holidays

December 16, 2020December 6, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

Gift guide: 12 books on climate can environment for the holidays

“For this year’s holiday gift guide,” writes Dr. Michael Svoboda, “Yale Climate Connections has gathered celebrated anthologies, deep-dives into climate-related science and solutions, inspiring books from or about spiritual leaders, and visionary works of climate fiction.”

All were recently published, some within the month, writes Svoboda. These twelve books address decades of writing on climate change, reassess the challenges, offer hope and guidance for action, and envision very different climate-changed futures.

There is, for instance, the anthology The Fragile Earth: Writing from the New Yorker on Climate Change (Harper Collins),which includes Bill McKibben’s seminal essay “The End of Nature.” The anthology All We Can Save(Penguin Random House) edited by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Katharine K. Wilkinson is a collection of works dedicated to leadership “more characteristically feminine and more faithfully feminist, rooted in compassion, connection, creativity, and collaboration.”

Hope, guide to action and challenges are provided by Future Sea (University of Chicago Press) by Deborah Rowan Wright, The New Map (Penguin Random House) by Daniel Yergin, Solved:How the World’s Great Cities are Fixing the Climate Crisis (University of Toronto Press) by David Miller, Let Us Dream (Simon & Schuster) by Pope Francis. Tales of Two Planets (Penguin Random House) edited by John Freeman explores inequality and the impact of climate change.

Stand Up! Speak Up! (Penguin Random House) by Andrew Joyner celebrates the inspiration of youth in taking up action through hope, activism and community. Our Only Home: A Climate Appeal to the World (Hanover Square) by the Dalai Lama and Franz Alt is a manifesto that will empower us to take action and save the environment.

The novel The 2084 Report (Simon & Schuster) by James Lawrence Powell provides an “oral history” through interviews of the devastating effects of the Great Warming, which are both fascinating and frightening. My own novel A Diary in the Age of Water (Inanna Publications) chronicles the journeys of four generations of women, each carrying a unique relationship with water over a time of catastrophic change. Told in the form of a diary by a limnologist, the story explores a Canada mined for its water by United States, which, in turn, is owned by China. The Ministry for the Future (Hachette Book Group—Orbit) a novel by Kim Stanley Robinson uses fictional eyewitness accounts to tell the story of how climate change will affect us all.

Yale Climate Connections:

Edited by veteran journalist and journalism educator Bud Ward, Yale Climate Connections provides content developed by a network of experienced independent freelance science journalists, researchers, and educators across the country.Yale Climate Connections is an initiative of the Yale Center for Environmental Communication (YCEC), directed by Dr. Anthony Leiserowitz of the Yale School of the Environment, Yale University.

Dr. Michael Svoboda, an expert on climate change, is a professor at George Washington University and frequent contributor to Yale Climate Connections.

*Jackson Creek in early winter, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)*

How the Bdelloid Rotifer Lived for Millennia — Without Sex

December 13, 2020November 25, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

As a child, I always wanted a microscope.

I would have collected slimy waters from the scum ponds and murky puddles near my house. I would have brought them home and exposed them to the light of my microscope. I would then have peered deep into a secret world, where shady characters and alien forms lurked and traded.

It would be many years, when I was in college, before I finally witnessed this world—so alien, it might have inspired the science fiction books I wrote later as an adult. As it turned out, I was led to pursue a Masters of Science degree, studying periphyton (microscopic aquatic communities attached and associated with surfaces like rocks and plants) in local streams in the Eastern Townships of Quebec.

*Filamentous algae collected in Lake Ontario, ON (photo by Nina Munteanu)*

While my work focused on how diatoms (glass-walled algae) colonized surfaces, micro-invertebrates kept vying for my attention. Water fleas (cladocerans), copepods, rotifers, seed shrimps (ostracods) and water bears sang across my field of vision. They flitted, lumbered, wheeled and meandered their way like tourists lost in Paris. But this wasn’t Paris; I’d taken the blue pill and entered the rabbit hole into another world…

*Sketch of common zooplankton and phytoplankton (illustration by Nina Munteanu)*

The Secret—and Dangerous—World of Micro-Organisms

Small Freshwater habitats are home to a highly productive and diverse collection of micro-invertebrates—multicellular animals that can barely be seen with the naked eye. Many average from 0.5 to 1 mm in size and resemble little white blobs; however, a scholar can distinguish each invertebrate by its unique movement. For instance, when presented with a jar of pond water, I can usually distinguish among the wheel-like wandering of a gastrotrich, dirigible-like gliding of an ostracod (seed shrimp), the vertical goldfinch-style “hopping” of the cladoceran (water flea) as it beats its antennae, or the halting-jerking movements of copepods (oar-feet) as their antennae drive them along like a dingy propelled by an amateur oarsman.

Alas, puddles, ephemeral ponds and vernal pools pose sketchy habitats, given their tendency to appear and disappear in a wink. And like the thief in the night, they pose a harsh and uncertain home to many small organisms. These environments are ever-changing, unstable, chaotic and unpredictable. Yet, anyone who has studied these variable ecosystems understands that they team with life.

When a puddle or ephemeral pond dries up then reappears with rain, how can these communities thrive? Or do they all die off and then somehow recruit when the pond reappears? Many of these invertebrates have evolved creative ways to survive in very unstable environments. Some form a resting stage—a spore, resting egg or ‘tun’—that goes dormant and rides out the bad weather.

*Philodina, a bdelloid rotifer (microscope photo by Bob Blaylock)*

Animalcules & the Bdelloid Rotifer

In 1701, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek observed that “animalcules” (likely the bdelloid rotifer Philodina roseaola) survived desiccation and were “resurrected” when water was added to them. He’d discovered a highly resistant dormant state of an aquatic invertebrate to desiccation.

Dormancy is a common strategy of organisms that live in harsh and unstable environments and has been documented in crustaceans, rotifers, tardigrades, phytoplankton and ciliates. “Dormant forms of some planktonic invertebrates are among the most highly resistant … stages in the whole animal kingdom,” writes Jacek Radzikowski in a 2013 review in the Journal of Plankton Research. Radzikowski describes two states of dormancy: diapause and quiescence. (on right: sketch of bdelloid rotifer by Nina Munteanu)

Bdelloid rotifers can go into quiescent dormancy at practically any stage in their life cycle in response to unfavorable conditions. Early research noted that dormant animals could withstand freezing and thawing from −40°C to 100°C and storage under vacuum. They also tolerated high doses of UV and X radiation. Later work reported that some rotifers could survive extreme abiotic conditions, such as exposure to liquid nitrogen (−196°C) for several weeks or liquid helium (−269°C) for several hours. Desiccated adult bdelloid rotifers apparently survived minus 80°C conditions for more than 6 years. The dormant eggs of cladocerans and ostracods also survived below freezing temperatures for years.

Rotifers are cosmopolitan detrivores (they eat detritus) and contribute to the decomposition of organic matter. Rotifers create a vortex with ciliated tufts on their heads that resemble spinning wheels, sweeping food into their mouths. They often anchor to larger debris while they feed or inch, worm-like, along substrates. Some are sessile, living inside tubes or gelatinous holdfasts and may even be colonial. Rotifers reproduce by parthenogenesis (in the absence of mates), producing clones (like cladocerans). Resting eggs (sometimes called zygotes) survive when a pond dries up. Bdelloid rotifers don’t produce resting eggs; they survive desiccation through a process called anhydrobiosis, contracting into an inert form and losing most of their body water. Embryos, juveniles and adults can undergo this process. The bdelloid withdraws its head and food and contracts its body into a compact shape called a tun; a generally unprotected dormant state that remains permeable to gases and liquids. Like Tardigrades (see below), Bdelloid rotifers can resist ionizing radiation because they can repair DNA double-strand breaks.

The long-term survival and evolutionary success of bdelloid rotifers in the absence of sex arises from horizontal gene transfer via DNA repair.

In my eco-novel A Diary in the Age of Water the limnologist Lynna visits her technician Daniel as he peers through a microscope and makes the observation of why the bdelloid rotifer is well-suited to climate change:

I bent to peer through the eyepiece at what turned out to be a pond sample in a Petri dish. Attached to a pile of detritus shivering in the current, several microscopic metazoans—rotifers—swung like trees in a gale; they were feeding. Their ciliated disk-like mouths twirled madly, capturing plankton to eat. Watching them reminded me of my early research days as an honours undergrad at Concordia University in Montreal. Probably Philodina, I thought; I had seen many during my stream research in Quebec.
“They’re the future,” Daniel said, looking up at me with a smirk as I straightened.
I raised my eyebrows, inviting him to elaborate, which he cheerfully did.
“They’re the future because of their incredible evolutionary success and their ecological attraction to environmental disaster.” He knew he’d piqued my interest. “These little creatures have existed for over forty million years, Lynna. Without sex! And they’re everywhere. In temporary ponds, moss, even tree bark. Bdelloid mothers that go through desiccation produce daughters with increased fitness and longevity. In fact, if desiccation doesn’t occur over several generations, the rotifers lose their fitness. They need the unpredictable environment to keep robust.” They incorporate genes from their environment: they acquire DNA transposons—mobile DNA—through HGT.”
—A DIARY IN THE AGE OF WATER

The bdelloid all-female populations have thrived for millions of years by maintaining a robust and diverse population through epigenetics and DNA repair during dormancy…The dormancy of all-female bdelloids is an elegant technique to ride out harsh conditions. The bdelloids can go dormant quickly in any stage of their life cycle, and they’re capable of remaining dormant for decades. They can recover from their dormancy state within hours when the right conditions return and go on reproducing without the need to find a mate.

Highly variable environments tend to support rare species: organisms that are uniquely equipped for change. These are the explorers, misfits, and revolutionaries who do their work to usher in a new paradigm. They carry change inside them, through phenotypic plasticity, physiological stress response mechanisms, or life history adaptations. Like bdelloid rotifers going dormant through anhydrobiosis. Or blue-green algae forming dormant akinete spores. In tune with the vacillations of Nature, epigenetics-induced adaptation is the only option for keeping up with rapid and catastrophic environmental change, not to mention something as gigantic as climate change. That’s why the bdelloid rotifers survived for millennia and will continue for many more. They adapt by counting on change.

*Maple swamp forest in Trent Nature Sanctuary, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)*

References:

Munteanu, Nina. 2020. “A Diary in the Age of Water.” Inanna Publications, Toronto. 300pp.

Munteanu, Nina. 2016. “Water Is…The Meaning of Water.” Pixl Press, Vancouver. 586pp.

O’Leary, Denise. 2015. “Horizontal gene transfer: Sorry, Darwin, it’s not your evolution anymore.” Evolution News, August 13, 2015. Online: https://www.evolutionnews.org/201508/horizontal_gene/

Ricci, C. And D. Fontaneto. 2017. “The importance of being a bdelloid: Ecological and evolutionary consequences of dormancy.” Italian Journal ofZoology, 76:3, 240-249.

Robinson, Kelly and Julie Dunning. 2016. “Bacteria and humans have been swapping DNA for millennia”. The Scientist Magazine, October 1, 2016. Online: https://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/47125/title/Bacteria-and-Humans-Have-Been-Swapping-DNA-for-Millennia/

Weinhold, Bob. 2006. “Epigenetics: the science of change.” Environmental Health Perspectives, 114(3): A160-A167.

Williams, Sarah. 2015. “Humans may harbour more than 100 genes from other organisms”. Science, March 12, 2015. Online: http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/03/humans-may-harbor-more-100-genes-other-organisms

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press (Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times ‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” was released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.

Nina Munteanu Interviewed About “A Diary in the Age of Water” by Simon Rose

November 22, 2020October 10, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

I was recently interviewed by Canadian writer Simon Rose on my recent novel release “A Diary in the Age of Water” by Inanna Publications. Set mostly in near-future and far-future Toronto area, the book has already received some praise:

“Evoking Ursula LeGuin’s unflinching humane and moral authority, Nina Munteanu takes us into the lives of four generations of women and their battles against a global giant that controls and manipulates Earth’s water…In language both gritty and hauntingly poetic, Munteanu delivers an uncompromising warning of our future.”—Lynn Hutchinson Lee, Toronto playwright

Dragonfly.eco calls the book “an insightful novel…a cautionary tale rummaging through the forgotten drawers of time in the lives of four generations…This whirling, holistic, and evolving novel comes alive, like we imagine water does.”

The novel received a five-star review in Foreword Clarion Review and Kirkus Reviews writes: “Munteanu transmutes a harrowing dystopia into a transcendentalist origin myth. A sobering and original cautionary tale that combines a family drama with an environmental treatise.”

Part of the story is told through the diary of a limnologist (someone who studies freshwater) who witnesses and suffers through severe water taxes and imposed restrictions, dark intrigue through neighbourhood water betrayals, corporate spying and espionage, and repression of her scientific freedoms. Some people die. Others disappear… Here’s an excerpt from the interview:

What is “A Diary in the Age of Water” about?

The book is essentially a journey of four generations of women who have a unique relationship with water, through a time of extreme change through climate change and water shortage. The book spans over forty years (from the 2020s to the 2060s) and into the far future, mostly through the diary of a limnologist, which is found by a future water-being. During the diarist’s lifetime, all things to do with water are overseen and controlled by the international giant water utility CanadaCorp—with powers to arrest and detain anyone. This is a world in which China owns America and America, in turn, owns Canada.

You mention the” Age of Water” in your book. Are there other ages/epochs?

Yes. The story begins in the far future with young Kyo during the Age of Trees, after the end of the Age of Water. It is, in fact, the end of that age as well and that is why she prepares for the Exodus to “humanity’s” new home.

What inspired you to write this book?

My publisher in Rome (Mincione Edizioni) had asked me for a short story on water and politics. I wanted to write about Canada and I wanted something ironic… so I chose water scarcity in Canada, a nation rich in water. The bilingual story “The Way of Water” (“La natura dell’acqua”) resulted, which has been reprinted in several magazines and anthologies, including Cli-Fi: Canadian Tales of Climate Change (Exile Editions), Future Fiction: New Dimensions in International Science Fiction (Future Fiction/Rosarium Publishing), Little Blue Marble Magazine, and Climate Crisis Anthology (Little Blue Marble). The story was about young Hilde—the daughter of the diarist (of the novel). Hilde was dying of thirst in Toronto and the story begged for more … so the novel came from it…

Why did you choose to write your novel as a diary?

I was writing about both the far and the near future and much of it was based—like Margaret Atwood and her books—on real events and even real people. I wanted personal relevance to what was going on, particularly with climate change. I also wanted to achieve a gritty realism of “the mundane” and a diary felt right. Lynna—the diarist—is also a reclusive inexpressive character, so I thought a personal diary would help bring out her thoughts and feelings more. There’s nothing like eves-dropping to make the mundane exciting. The diary-aspect of the book characterizes it as “mundane science fiction” by presenting an “ordinary” setting for characters to play out. The tension arises more from insidious cumulative events and circumstances that slowly grow into something incendiary.

Your book has been described by various reviewers and literary types as being anything from literary fiction and FemLit to science fiction, Cli-Fi and eco-fiction How would you describe it?

Otonabee shoreline, ON (photo by Nina Munteanu)

It’s really all these things. The story carries the personal journeys of four strong and complex women characters. It gives them much agency in dealing with the climate and water crisis—socially, politically, and environmentally. One is a political activist, another a wary scientist, and another an anarchist. However, while A Diary in the Age of Water showcases strong women characters, its main climate and environmental theme carries the story through the four generations to its climax. In the end, the book’s classification will depend on the reader, who will decide which aspect of the novel resonates the most with them. The main protagonist in “A Diary in the Age of Water” is a limnologist (someone who studies freshwater); so are you. Is there any resemblance? Both Lynna and I chose to study water through the discipline of limnology; Lynna did most of her work on Canadian glaciers, while my focus was on small streams in southern Quebec. We also share similar views on the environment and humanity’s place in it. I might even have some of her character foibles … hopefully not ALL of them. However, how she chose to live that worldview—cloistered, repressed, and fearful—is not me at all. I tend to bluster, confront, and generally get into trouble. In that way, I might more resemble Lynna’s daughter. Having said that, I’d say that all good characters have a piece of the writer in them. Some dark and some light. How can they not? In this case, the resemblance with the diarist is heightened because she is depicted through her diary, which adds a gritty realism and a highly personal aspect to the first person fiction. There’s a piece of me in each of the four women depicted in the story.

You mentioned that each of the four generations of women have a singular relationship with water. What role does water play in the book?

Well, in some important way, water is the fifth character. You could say even the main character. Water is the theme that carries each woman on her personal journey with climate change and the devastation that occurs—through water, I might add. Climate change is a water phenomenon, after all… So, water—like place and setting—plays a subtle yet powerful role in the story, influencing each character in her own way and bringing them together in the overall journey of humanity during a time of great and catastrophic change.

Pond lily, ON (photo by Nina Munteanu)

The diary spans a twenty-year period in the mid-twenty-first century and describes a Canada in the grips of severe water scarcity. Tell us about that—how does a water-rich country like Canada suffer severe water scarcity?

Trent Canal, ON (photo by Nina Munteanu)

Ecologists and economists alike (who truly understand water and its global distribution and movement) will tell you that there is, in fact enough water on the planet; scarcity results from its unequal distribution, pollution and toxic input, squandering, diversion, and manipulation (one example being making rain and instructing it to fall here rather than there). Maude Barlow (Chairperson of the Council of Canadians) will tell you that Canada is currently at risk of giving away much of its water. Foreign companies are now mining Canada’s watersheds with impunity and at minimal cost. Under my premise, United States (and China) aggressively mines Canada’s groundwater, glaciers, rain and surface water through massive diversion projects to rehydrate the dwindling aquifers of the United States.

My premise is based on real events currently ongoing throughout the world. China leads the world in rainmaking and manipulation. Egypt plans to pump water from Lake Nassar into the Sahara as tensions between Egypt, and nine upstream countries for control of water in the Nile watershed increase from dams the Sudanese and Ethiopians build and as Tanzania pumps water from Lake Victoria, and Kenya diverts lakes feeding Lake Victoria to its arid eastern regions. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and China are in conflict over control of rivers such as the Indus, Ganges, and particularly the Brahmaputra. India’s River Link Plan impacts Bangladesh. As Pakistan, Kashmir and India fight over more and more water, the Indus dries up and no longer flows into the ocean. Meantime, Russian scientists are reviving a 1930s Soviet plan to reverse some of Siberia’s largest rivers to the parched former Soviet republics of central Asia with plans to replenish the Aral Sea. This is something very similar to the USA’s 1960 plan to divert Canada’s northward waterways south to rehydrate America’s drying midwest. Massive water diversion is also being debated within a single country; Spain’s water-rich northern region has fallen under pressure by Spain’s water-poor southern region, provoking the controversial Ebro diversion project. Norwegian university professor Terje Tvedt aptly concludes: “At the heart of these gigantic enterprises lies one of history’s great paradoxes: the more humans try to tame and regulate water by means of large-scale elaborate projects, the more water will, in turn, control society.”

Back to Canada and my not so outlandish premise: by the 2040s, Canadians are indentured to US needs through massive diversions and resulting water-use restrictions. One example, taken from precedent set in states like Colorado, is an imposed ruling by CanadaCorp that Canadians cannot collect rainwater. Something several states have already implemented.

The novel mentions a huge water diversion plan called NAWAPA. Can you tell us about that?

The original NAWAPA (North America Water Power Alliance) Plan was drawn up by the Pasadena-based firm of Ralph M. Parsons Co. in 1964, and had a favorable review by Congress for completion in the 1990s. The plan—thankfully never completed—was drafted by the US Army Corps of Engineers and entailed the southward diversion of a portion (if not all) of the Mackenzie and Yukon rivers in northern Canada and Alaska, now flowing into the Arctic Ocean as well as the Peace, Liard and other rivers flowing into the Pacific by creating massive dams in the north. This would cause the rivers to flow backwards into the mountains to form vast reservoirs that would flood one-tenth of British Columbia. The water would be channeled south through the 800-km Rocky Mountain Trench Reservoir into the Northern USA, and from there along various routes into the dry regions of the South, to California and reaching as far as Mexico.

NAWAPA was envisioned as the largest construction effort of all times, comprising some 369 separate projects of dams, canals, and tunnels, for water diversion. The water diversion would be accomplished through a series of connecting tunnels, canals, lakes, dams, and pump-lifts, as the trench itself is located at an elevation of 914 m (3,000 feet). To the east, a 9 m (thirty-foot) deep canal would be cut from the Peace River to Lake Superior. NAWAPA’s largest proposed dam would be 518 m (1,700 feet) tall, more than twice the height of Hoover Dam (at 221 m) and taller than any dam in the world today, including the Jinping-I Dam in China (at 305 m).

In the novel, NAWAPA-2 gets completed by 2045, which includes creating a giant inland sea in the Rocky Mountain Trench in British Columbia and a huge diversion in central Canada as well.

Very intriguing. Where can readers purchase the book?

They can buy the book in most quality bookstores such as Chapters-Indigo, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon. They can also purchase the book through the publisher, Inanna Publications.

Best of luck, Nina, on this book!

Thanks, Simon!

“A Diary in the Age of Water” Receives Literary Titan Award

October 21, 2020October 23, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

Nina Munteanu’s cli-fi eco-novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” was awarded a Silver Literary Titan Award for a book that:

“expertly delivers complex characters, intricate worlds, and thought provoking themes. The ease with which the story is told is a reflection of the author’s talent in exercising fluent, powerful, and appropriate language.”–Literary Titan

“A Diary in the Age of Water” received a 4-star review by Literary Titan:

While bringing attention to the current politicization of climate change, the story maintains important underlying themes like family, love, forgiveness, and the complexity of the human soul. The author has gone to great lengths to show that there are different layers to each character, none fully evil nor fully good. A Diary in the Age of Water is an exceptional and thought-provoking dystopian fiction.
—LITERARY TITAN (4-star)

Atlantykron Summer Academy—2020

October 17, 2020October 19, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / 3 Comments

Because of the COVID19 pandemic, The 31^st annual summer academy for learning was held virtually this year by New Horizons (of the World Genesis Foundation and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization).

Because of this, I was finally able to participate. Virtually and all the way from Canada.

Atlantykron on the Danube

The international event is normally held on an island on the Danube River near the village and ancient Roman ruins of Capidava, Romania. First held in the summer of 1989, the event has attracted hundreds of youth and teachers from around the world to learn with scientists, artists, writers and other professionals in a wilderness setting.

Coordinated by Sorin Repanovici of the World Genesis Foundation and run by Dr. Florin Munteanu, Heather Caton-Anderson and Constantin D. Pavel, Atlantykron promotes UNESCO core goals of promoting sustainable development and creating dialogue and collaboration among nations in the areas of education, science, culture and communications.

Key presentations in the 2020 Atlantykron included:

“New Horizons of Animal-Human Relationships” by Chan Chow Wah in China
“Mars 2020 Mission Perseverance” by Ravi Prakash and Erisa K. Stilley in USA
“Planning and Scripting a Time-Lapse Movie” by Stan Jiman in USA
“Generating & Solving Crisis to Avoid Imbalance and Catastrophe” by Dr. Florin Colceag in Romania
“The Science and Meaning of Water” by Nina Munteanu in Canada
“Who’s Afraid of Autonomous Cars” by Pompilian Tofilescu in USA

Dr. Florin Munteanu

I’d met Florin Munteanu in 2012, when I went to Bucharest, Romania to participate in the launch of the Romanian translation of my book The Fiction Writer (Manual de Scriere Creativa: scriitorul de fictiune) with Editura Paralela 45 at the Gaudeamus Book Fair. Florin met me at the airport and took me to the Phoenicia Grand Hotel where I was staying. We had some coffee and pastries over a wonderful chat and he then coordinated a tour of the city for me with one of his students at the Centre of Complexity Studies where he taught.

When Florin invited me to speak at Atlantykron 2020, I was more than pleased.

Nina with “Water Is…”

As a limnologist and with two major books on water published, I gave a talk on the science and meaning of water. Much of what I shared is in my book Water Is… The Meaning of Water, which provides 12 different angles on what water means—to different people from scientists and technologists to politicians, spiritualists and lay folk.

Water is so much more than the sum of its parts…

“Ultimately, water and our relationship with it is a curious gestalt of magic and paradox. Like the Suntelia Aion described by the Greeks, water cuts recursive patterns of creative destruction through the landscape, an ouroborous remembering. It changes, yet stays the same, shifting its face with the climate. It wanders the earth like a gypsy, stealing from where it is needed and giving whimsically where it isn’t wanted; aggressive yet yielding. Life-giving yet dangerous. Water is the well-spring of life. Yet it is the River Styx that leads the dead to Hades… Water is a shape shifter.”—Water Is…The Meaning of Water

Nina with “A Diary in the Age of Water”

I overviewed some of water’s many anomalous qualities such as its unique density, cohesive, and adhesive properties—all life-giving. I discussed the water bridge, demonstrated by Dr. Elmar C. Fuchs and Professor Jakob Woisetchlager in 2007. I explored why water—particularly moving water—makes us feel so good (all those negative ions!). I went over the water cycle, water’s role in most natural cycles, and how it contributes to climate.

I then explored some of the oddest but most common tiny water residents. One example is the bdelloid rotifer—featured in my latest novel A Diary in the Age of Water—which is smaller than a millimeter, ubiquitous, lives wherever there is some water and can withstand desiccation, drying up into a dormant stage called a tun. Bdelloids create protective proteins, such as LEA, which act as a molecular shield.

Sketch of a bdelloid rotifer (illustration by Nina Munteanu)

The bdelloid rotifer has existed for over forty million years. It reproduces through obligate parthenogenesis to produce all females, called thelytoky. Their long-term survival and evolutionary success in the absence of sex is largely a function of ecological adaptation that involves horizontal gene transfer through DNA repair. While they are patching up their broken genes from desiccation, they stitch in foreign DNA from the environment through horizontal gene transfer.

I ended the talk with some notes about conservation and stewardship of water. Using twelve-year old Rachel Parent and Greta Thunberg as examples, I stressed that no one is too young or too alone to make a difference; we then explored several activities that anyone could do.

Launch of “A Diary in the Age of Water” by Nina Munteanu

June 27, 2020July 2, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

On June 18^th, Toronto book publishing house Inanna Publications launched its second spring series and A Diary in the Age of Water, my near-future/far-future speculative fiction book was among them.

A Diary in the Age of Water follows the climate-induced journey of Earth and humanity through four generations of women, each with a unique relationship to water.

Evoking Ursula LeGuin’s unflinching humane and moral authority, Nina Munteanu takes us into the lives of four generations of women and their battles against a global giant that controls and manipulates Earth’s water. In a diary that entwines acute scientific observation with poignant personal reflection, Lynna’s story unfolds incrementally, like climate change itself. Particularly harrowing are the neighbourhood water betrayals, along with Lynna’s deliberately dehydrated appearance meant to deflect attention from her own clandestine water collection. Her estrangement from her beloved daughter, her “dark cascade” who embarks upon a deadly path of her own, is heartwrenching. Munteanu elegantly transports us between Lynna’s exuberant youth and her tormented present, between microcosm and macrocosm, linking her story and struggles – and those of her mother, daughter and granddaughter – to the life force manifest in water itself. In language both gritty and hauntingly poetic, Munteanu delivers an uncompromising warning of our future.

—Lynn Hutchinson Lee

Renee Knapp and Nina Munteanu toast Inanna and all participants at the launch

A Diary in the Age of Water starts with young Kyo in the dying boreal forest of what used to be northern Canada. Kyo yearns inordinately for the Age of Water, a turbulent time of great change, before the “Water Twins” destroyed humanity. Looking for answers and plagued by vivid dreams of this holocaust, Kyo discovers the diary of Lynna, a limnologist from a time just prior to the destruction.

At the book launch, I read from Lynna’s first diary entry—in 2045. I then answered questions from audience members who came from Canada’s coast to coast:

What inspired you to write this book?

Who really… My publisher in Rome (Mincione Edizioni) had asked me for a short story on water and politics. I wanted to write about Canada and I wanted something ironic… so I chose water scarcity in Canada, a nation rich in water. “The Way of Water” (“La natura dell’acqua”) resulted, which has been reprinted in several magazines and anthologies, including Cli-Fi: Canadian Tales of Climate Change (Exile Editions), Future Fiction: New Dimensions in International Science Fiction (Future Fiction/Rosarium Publishing), Little Blue Marble Magazine, and Climate Crisis Anthology (Little Blue Marble). The story was about young Hilde—the daughter of the diarist—dying of thirst in Toronto… It begged for more … so the novel came from it…

Why did you choose to write your novel as a diary?

If the oceans are rising because the ice caps are melting, is the ocean actually getting less salty?

The short answer is “yes.” As glaciers melt and introduce fresh water to the ocean—contributing to the rise in sea level—salinity is reduced in the surrounding sea. This has far-reaching consequences that lie beyond just rising sea levels and promise to affect all ocean life. Because freshwater is less dense than seawater—hence the saltwater wedge we experience on the lower Fraser River in Vancouver—freshwater increase in seawater will interfere with the pattern, mixing, and movement of ocean currents; this could be devastating to ocean life. The overall movement of ocean currents throughout the planet is called the Great Ocean Conveyor—or Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC)—which circulates ocean water very much like in a lake, with dense water sinking beneath warmer, less salty water. As my diarist in the book writes, dumping in more and more freshwater into the ocean has slowed the sinking (and mixing) and the whole machine is slowing down. Freshwater is jamming the conveyor. If it stalls, this would unbalance the heat flux of the planet with more climate devastation.

Sketch of Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) from “A Diary in the Age of Water” Inanna Publications (sketch by Nina Munteanu)

The main protagonist is a limnologist; so are you; is there any resemblance?

Oh yes! Well, apart from the obvious—we both chose the same scientific discipline, we have similar views on the environment and humanity’s place in it. I might even have some of her foibles…hopefully not ALL of them… But, I’d say that all good characters have a piece of ourselves in them. Some dark and some light. The resemblance is heightened because she is depicted through her diary, which adds a gritty realism and a highly personal aspect to the fiction. In truth there’s a piece of me in each of the four women depicted in the story.

What is happening to the water in Ontario?

Water quality in Ontario waterways has not improved in the last decade and this can be placed squarely on the shoulders of local, regional and provincial governments and their failure to legislate and act. Inaction varies from lack of regulations and policing of industry to lack of city infrastructure and lack of ecological foresight.

Cladophora alga in Lake Ontario

Lake Ontario itself receives pollution from Chicago, Sarnia, Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, Hamilton and Toronto. Pollution includes agricultural runoff (such as excess nutrients and cancer-causing pesticides and herbicides), disease-carrying sewage, and hormone-disrupting storm water runoff. Nine million people rely on the lake for drinking water. Greatest threats to the lake’s health come from urban development, electricity generation, sewage, and storm water contamination. In cities with large amounts of impervious surfaces, storm water runs over pavement and parking lots, picking up oil and other pollutants before flowing into a nearby river or stream. Flash floods are often accompanied by sewage overflow, which carries numerous pathogens. In addition, storm water picks up toxic heavy metals, endocrine disrupting chemicals and pharmaceuticals. All with devastating consequences to humans, never mind aquatic life and other wildlife.

Every five years the Conservation Authority Watershed Report Cards provide an assessment of ground and surface water quality in various watersheds of Ontario. The latest one by the TRCA (Toronto and Region Conservation Authority) in 2018 gave an overall grade of “D” (unchanged from 2013). They cited storm water runoff and lack of its management improvement as the chief reason for the poor grade. Increasing chloride concentrations in the Toronto region (mostly from liberal use of road salt) poses a real problem to aquatic life.

Forest swamp in Deas Park, BC (photo by Nina Munteanu)

You mentioned that each of the four generations of women have a singular relationship with water. What role does water play in the book?

Are there other ages/epochs?

All Inanna titles are 30% off with coupon code: summer20. Please also consider purchasing “A Diary in the Age of Water” from an independent bookstore this summer. Find your local bookstore: http://open-book.ca/News/Your-Community-Your-Bookstore. And here is the current map of independent bookstores that are doing curbside pick up and delivery across Canada.

Surf on Hirtle Beach, NS (photo and illustration by Nina Munteanu)

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press(Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” was released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.

Petrichor—The Smell of Rain…

May 30, 2020June 12, 2020 / thealiennextdoor / 2 Comments

In my novel A Diary in the Age of Water, the diarist, Lynna Dresden, writes in her entry for September 9, 2048:

Petrichor: A pleasant smell that frequently accompanies the first rain after a long period of warm, dry weather. The rain helps release plant oils into the air and chemicals produced by soil-dwelling bacteria called actinomycetes. The term arose from the Greek petra (“stone”) and ichor, the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods.

I know that musty, barky aroma of fresh rain on the dry earth. I know it well. It was the scent in the air when I gave birth to Hildegard seven years ago. She was born on the first rain in forty days. It wouldn’t rain for another forty.

Despite the nurses at the hospital discouraging me, I took my baby girl outside and let the fresh rain spatter our faces and soak us through. Little Hilde loved it. She cooed and watched with the awe of innocence. She’s still so innocent and still loves water.

She’s in Grade Two now and doesn’t comprehend that it isn’t God who controls the weather and the rain; it’s CanadaCorp.

Raindrops in a creek, ON (photo by Nina Munteanu)

Rich Hardy of New Atlas adds that a recent study in Nature Microbiology demonstrates that the bacteria evolved to release this chemical to attract a particular arthropod as a way to spread their spores. “The smell is a 500-million-year-old example of chemical communication, evolved to help a particular type of bacteria spread,” writes Hardy.

The term petrichor was created by Isabel Joy Bear and Richard G. Thomas, two Australian researchers after an article in Nature, in which authors described how the smell originates from an oil produced by plants during dry periods. The oil is released into the air along with geosmin, a metabolic by-product of certain actinobacteria when it rains.

One major component of petrichor is an organic compound called geosmin. Scientists already knew that a common genus of bacteria, known as Streptomyces, produce geosmin. Virtually all species of Streptomyces release geosmin when they die; but until now it was unclear why they generated this distinctive scent.

“The fact that they all make geosmin suggested that it confers a selective advantage on the bacteria, otherwise they wouldn’t do it,” says Mark Buttner, one of the researchers. “We suspected they were signaling to something and the most obvious thing would be some animal or insect that might help distribute the Streptomyces spores.”

Researchers discovered that geosmin specifically attracts springtails—a type of tiny arthropod—that use their antennae to sense chemical. The Streptomyces serve as food for the springtails; the springtails in turn help spread the bacterial spores. This suggests that the two organisms co-evolved in a symbiotic relationship. “This is analogous to birds eating the fruits of plants; they get food but they also distribute the seeds, which benefits the plants,” said Buttner.

Streptomyces—one of the most important sources of antibiotics to humans—relies on the springtail, given that its antibiotic compounds make it toxic to other potential distributors such as fruit flies or nematodes. Springtails generate a number of enzymes that can detoxify the antibiotics produced by Streptomyces. This suggests a form of aggressive symbiosis in a co-evolution between these two organisms—an interaction that is more common in Nature than previously thought.

The earthy scent of rain on dry soil evokes wonderful memories of playful childhood, freedom and awestruck wonder. Why not? Petrichor is, after all, the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods…

For more on “ecology” and a good summary and description of environmental factors like aggressive symbiosis, co-evolution, and other ecological relationships, read my book “The Ecology of Story: World as Character” (Pixl Press, 2019).

Glossary of Terms:

Aggressive Symbiosis: a common form of symbiosis where one or both symbiotic partners demonstrates an aggressive and potentially harmful effect on the other’s competitor or potential predator (Ryan, 1997).

Co-evolution: when two or more species reciprocally affect each other’s evolution through the process of natural selection and other processes.

Petrichor: A pleasant smell that frequently accompanies the first rain after a long period of warm, dry weather. The rain helps release plant oils into the air and chemicals produced by soil-dwelling bacteria called actinomycetes. The term arose from the Greek petra (“stone”) and ichor, the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods.

Symbiosis: Greek for “companionship” describes a close and long term interaction between two organisms that may be beneficial (mutualism), beneficial to one with no effect on the other (commensalism), or beneficial to one at the expense of the other (parasitism). (Munteanu, 2019).

References:

Frazer, Jennifer. 2015. “Root Fungi Can Turn Pine Trees Into Carnivores—or at Least Accomplices.” Scientific American, May 12, 2015. Online: https://blogs. scientificamerican.com/artful-amoeba/root-fungi-can-turn-pine-trees-into- carnivores-8212-or-at-least-accomplices/

Hardy, Rich. 2020. “The 500-million-year-old reason behind the unique scent of rain” New Atlas.

Munteanu, N. 2019. “The Ecology of Story: World as Character.” Pixl Press, Vancouver, BC. 198pp. (Section 2.7 Evolutionary Strategies)

Munteanu, N. 2020. “A Diary in the Age of Water.” Inanna Publications, Toronto. 300pp.

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press (Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times ‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” will be released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.

Age of Water Podcast: Nina Reads from “Water Is…”

February 29, 2020March 17, 2022 / thealiennextdoor / Leave a comment

We are now living in the Age of Water. Water is the new “gold”, with individuals, corporations and countries positioning themselves around this precious resource. Water is changing everything. The Age of Water Podcast covers anything of interest from breaking environmental news to evergreen material. This also includes human interest stories, readings of eco-literature, discussion of film and other media productions of interest.

In this episode of Age of Water, Nina reads from her book “Water Is…The Meaning of Water”, a celebration of the varied faces of water and what they mean to us.

Water is emerging as one of the single most important resources of Planet Earth. Already scarce in some areas, it has become the new “gold” to be bought, traded, coveted, cherished, hoarded, and abused worldwide. It is currently traded on the Stock Exchange…

Nina Munteanu’s “Water Is…”represents the culmination of over twenty-five years of dedication as limnologist and aquatic ecologist in the study of water. As a research scientist and environmental consultant, Nina studied water’s role in energizing and maintaining the biomes, ecosystems, and communities of our precious planet.

During her consulting career for industry and government, Nina discovered a great disparity between humanity’s use, appreciation and understanding of water. This set in motion a quest to further explore our most incredible yet largely misunderstood and undervalued substance. Part history, part science and part philosophy and spirituality, “Water Is…” combines personal journey with scientific discovery that explores water’s many “identities” and ultimately our own.

Nina Munteanu kayaks in Desolation Sound off coast of British Columbia (photo by H. Klassen)

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press (Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times ‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” will be released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.