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Peter Rock had a prop to help him write My Abandonment: A toy horse decorated with acupuncture numbers he picked up in a shop in Portland's Old Town. The novel is based on news accounts of a father and young daughter camping for four years in Forest Park. They were discovered, re-settled on a horse farm, then disappeared again.
In the book, Rock named the toy horse Randy and made it a precious possession of the girl. Much of his story picks up where the news accounts end. He says he probably could have found out more real details about the girl and her father, Frank, but he didn't want to.
Rock kicked off our Northwest Passages series last spring and starts this week of special rebroadcasts as well. Do you remember the story when it was in the news? Have you read My Abandonment, or any of his other novels about lives on the edge? Or have you read a different, new book based on the same story? Share your thoughts here.
Tagged as: author · homeless · northwest passages · peter rock
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My daughter (13) and I listened today and she came away wanting to read your book. I personally like books that weave real events into fiction. She felt you may have invaded their privacy by writing about them, but I countered that stories about people that don't conform to the "norm" are pretty much fair game and of general interest. She also felt that the father does a disservice to the girl by not allowing her to become socialised within her peer group, ie isolating her from school and age peers. This story reminds me strongly of the movie, "Off the Map" which follows the growing up of a girl who is in remote NM, only to enter society, and then later return. I suppose, in one way or another, we all have our "4o days in the wilderness"...
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Sounds interesting. I will definitely give 'My Abandonment' a read. Waxing Toronto Threading Richmond Hill
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Is there any sense of dealing with the devil in nesting this fictional account so neatly within the space of the real events that inspired you. If you had taken the germ of the story and set in upstate New York for instance wouldn't this book have been spared the chest thumping indignation about, and the marketing opportunities that come from, the confusion of 'real' and fiction. Would it have been as easy to get published if it didn't have the hook of a true story?