Cynthia Johnstone is the author of the new novel Nomad. A former pediatric therapist, she lives in Flagstaff, Arizona.
Q: What inspired you to write Nomad, and how did you create your character Corey?
A: Corey Collins was inspired by many of the women I’m surrounded by here in the small mountain town of Flagstaff, Arizona. They’re smart, strong, adventurous, incredibly capable women who, quite literally, seem able to do anything. There’s something in the water here, because these women are tough! And I admire that greatly.
But what intrigues me even more is the strength we don’t always see. So many women are walking around carrying invisible wounds while still accomplishing monumental things. They’re raising families, building lives, climbing mountains, starting over, taking risks. And often doing it without anyone fully understanding what they’ve survived. When you dig a little deeper, you start uncovering amazing truths that often go undiscovered.
I wanted Corey to be a tribute to that kind of woman: the quiet, independent survivor. Someone who doesn’t necessarily follow the mainstream route or heal in the way other people expect her to but instead listens to herself and finds her own path forward.
Corey’s strength isn’t about being fearless or unaffected by what happened to her. It’s about continuing to build a life despite it, and in a way that might not be conventional, but works for her.
I think we sometimes have a preconceived idea of what healing is supposed to look like, when in reality, it looks different for everyone. Corey finds what works for her, and I wanted to honor that.
Q: The novel is set in Arizona--how important is setting to you in your writing?
A: Setting is incredibly important to me. I grew up in the Midwest, so I know towering maple trees, humidity, harsh winters, and the deafening hum of cicadas in summer. When we moved to Arizona 10 years ago, it felt like an entirely new playground for me to discover: cacti, dry air, mountains, unfamiliar plants and wildlife, enormous skies.
It reminded me a little of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. As though I’d pushed through the coats at the back of the closet and somehow stepped into another world.
And then there was Sedona…
I’ve never experienced another place quite like it. There’s the obvious physical beauty of the red rocks, but there’s also something harder to define about the landscape. It can feel peaceful and wild, welcoming and unforgiving, all at once. It attracts people who are searching for something, escaping something, or trying to reinvent themselves. As a novelist, that gives me a lot to work with.
Sedona became more than the backdrop for Nomad. The land is a character itself. It gives Corey somewhere to disappear, but it also challenges her, protects her, and ultimately becomes part of the way she finds herself again. Even after finishing Nomad, I haven’t been able to walk away from it. There’s simply too much there left to explore.
Q: How was the book’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?
A: Nomad. I love the word itself and the feeling it evokes: a wanderer, a traveler, someone—or something—you can’t quite pin down or control. A nomad is meant to move, to explore, to keep going.
I like the idea that maybe we should all have a little bit of the nomad in us…a part of ourselves that remains curious, that keeps exploring and learning, and that is willing to leave behind what no longer serves us.
There’s a bit of mystery in the word, too, which felt right for this story. And, as readers will discover, there’s far more meaning behind the name Nomad than what first meets the eye. I love that the title can mean one thing when you begin the novel and something entirely different by the time you finish it and that’s certainly the case here.
Q: Did you know how the novel would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?
A: I had no idea how the ending would unfold and that’s actually part of the joy of writing for me.
I’m very much a discovery writer, or a prancer, as it’s sometimes referred to the literary world. I learn about the story as I’m writing it and try to give the characters, setting, and circumstances enough room to lead me somewhere I might not have anticipated.
Sometimes a character does something I didn’t expect, or a seemingly small detail suddenly becomes important, and those discoveries are some of my favorite moments in the process.
I tend to write toward what feels emotionally true rather than forcing the story into a predetermined mold. Of course, that can make the process messier, and it certainly means plenty of revising, but I think it also leaves room for surprise. And if I’m surprised by where the story takes me, there’s a good chance the reader might be, too.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I’m working on a novel tentatively titled Rae, which, once again, takes place in Sedona. I can’t seem to disengage from the magic of that landscape or from the interesting people it attracts!
But Rae has a very different energy from Nomad. Nomad is, in many ways, a story of self-discovery and a slow meditation on solitude, grief, healing, and the land. Rae has a much stronger action beat carrying it along. Where Nomad settles into the landscape, Rae comes bulldozing through it.
At the center is Rae, a tough as nails, longtime massage therapist at a luxury Sedona resort who becomes entangled in the life of a young client she suspects is being abused by her husband. Rae makes a decision to intervene and from there, things begin moving very quickly.
There’s almost a Thelma & Louise energy to parts of it: women, danger, loyalty, the desert, and the question of how far you’re willing to go to save someone else. It’s been incredibly fun to write because it lets me return to a landscape I love while telling a completely different kind of story.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: Maybe just that Nomad is ultimately a story about what happens after the worst thing has already happened.
I was interested in the life that comes after tragedy…the part we don’t always see. How does someone rebuild when there’s no way to undo what has been lost? What does healing actually look like when it isn’t neat, linear or mainstream?
For Corey, it looks like solitude. It looks like 27 acres in the Arizona desert, a life stripped down to its essentials, and eventually, an unexpected dog who asks nothing from her except that she let him stay.
At its center, I think Nomad is about the quiet ways we find our way back to ourselves and about the possibility that sometimes the thing that saves us isn’t what we went looking for at all.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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