![]() With the seventh book in the series now in the revision process, Kelly recently began work on the eighth-“what I now believe is the last one.” She expects it will be ready for release in 2025, following her usual process of research, writing, and revision. “You can pick up any one of them and feel like the story is complete on its own,” Kelly says. “He’s aged with me,” she notes, “though he’s younger than me.” Although the novels are connected, following Guy’s adventures, they are also fully self-contained. “I called the third one The Last Creation, because I thought, OK, that’s it.” But it turned out Guy had more stories to share. Then she found she was ready to tell another story. Kelly wrote the second book in the series because she thought readers might be interested in what happened to Guy next. ![]() “Guy was a young 20-something when I first wrote the book in 1984,” she says. Kelly was not planning a series when she introduced Guy in Elder Brother’s Maze, a novel that developed from an assignment in her MFA program. If he could find some cardboard and tape he’d make a repair that should keep the climate and critters out, at least. Guy felt bad about the mess of broken plastic scattered over it, though, and he opened the utility closet to pull out the broom and dust bin. There was a mat beside the door with a pair of rubber clogs on it, which seemed mighty practical to him-it would keep a house a lot cleaner if everyone dumped their shoes at the door. He turned his gaze to take in the small, comfortable living room a wood stove was set on a sheet metal pad in the corner, that futon couch would lay flat for a bed, the bright orange lounger was a little ratty at the arm rests but practically beckoned him over for a nap. The book takes readers to the Mogollon Rim in the middle of the state, and Kirkus Reviewsnotes that “Kelly’s prose is rich and observant, whether she’s writing about the landscape, people, or animals.” In People of the Sun, Kelly’s fifth book, series hero Guy Thornton is fighting for custody of his teenage son, Trick, and the case seems desperate until Guy gets help from Star Clarke, a medium who communicates with Trick’s deceased mother, Sally, a member of the Yavapai Nation. “A lot of people think of Arizona as the iconic desert and the saguaro cactus,” she says, but through her series of novels, the sixth volume of which was just published, she has been able to share many of the lesser-known aspects of the state. ![]() ![]() Jan Kelly is a lifelong Arizona resident, and she wants readers to understand the state’s long history and complex geography. ![]()
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