For Davisburg author Kathleen Rollins, a wrong turn in the Four Corners desert 30 years ago inspired her for a lifetime of writing and research.
“A friend and I were hiking, it was really, really hot, and we didn’t have enough water,” said Rollins. “We decided to split up for some reason. I was on my own ? I turned a corner, and boom, there were these handprints.”
The red painted handprints created by Native Americans centuries ago fired her imagination, and a life-long interest in prehistoric American cultures ? and where they came from.
After retiring from a career as a composition and literature teacher at Mott College in Flint, she started writing a series of adventure novels based on what she learned.
Her first book, “Misfits and Heroes: West from Africa,” is set 14,000 years ago, following ancient explorers in the Americas, including a group crossing the Atlantic from West Africa.
“The world the explorers face is wild and dangerous but also beautiful,” the author said.
Her second book, “Past the Last Island,” is about a group crossing the South Pacific.
“Polynesians found their way to Easter Island and Hawaii ? they were obviously drawn to impossible expeditions,” she said. “They took their families on these huge expeditions, looking for the edge of the world.”
In her lastest book, “A Meeting of Clans,” members of the two groups make contact in what is now southern Mexico.
“It’s not science fiction ? it’s absolutely possible,” said Rollins, who bases her books on what she has learned in years of travel and study in Europe, Africa, Australia, and the Americas, especially ancient sites in Mexico and Guatemala.
Her fourth book is in the works. In it, ancient people from what is now northern Spain make the oceanic crossing.
“The books are great for adult or young adult readers looking for epic adventure with some spirit magic,” the author said. “Shaman are connected to the power, like the Force, it’s the same idea. They’re capable of magic, but are also separate from the people. It’s the price to be paid, to live apart, like a monk.”
Rollins grew up in New York and moved to Michigan to attend Michigan State University. She raised two children with her husband, the late Steven Rollins.
“Misfits and Heroes” are available at Springfield Township Library, Pages Bookstore in Flint, Fenton Open Book, and Saturn Books in Gaylord, as well as Flint Public Library, and on-line at Amazon.com.