In Ill Wind, Barr's powerful new novel, Park Ranger Anna Pigeon confronts death among the ruins. Colorado's Mesa Verde National Park is noted for its well-preserved cliff dwellings, the sole legacy of the Anasazi civilization, which vanished without any other trace in the twelfth century. Separated from friends and family and haunted by personal demons, Anna finds solace in these quiet ruins, their pinon-scented turrets and towers backlit by the fading blue of distant mountain ranges. But the rugged beauty of the park and the mystery of the Anasazi are cruelly overshadowed by danger and death. An unusually high number of medical rescues and the unexpected death of an asthmatic child are followed by the sudden demise of a fellow ranger who is found neatly curled up in one of the ancient kivas, his hat and shoes at his side. Anna had thought she'd found a friend in this man, had seen him as a kindred spirit, but his death transforms him into an enigma. Puzzled and more deeply wounded than she'd ever dare admit, Anna immerses herself in the ensuing investigation. As she sifts through shifting loyalties and struggles to honor the past, she must face forces both seen and unseen which threaten her career - and her very life.
Nevada was born in the small western town of Yerington, Nevada and raised on a mountain airport in the Sierras. Both her parents were pilots and mechanics and her sister, Molly, continued the tradition by becoming a pilot for USAir.
Pushed out of the nest, Nevada fell into the theatre, receiving her BA in speech and drama and her MFA in Acting before making the pilgrimage to New York City, then Minneapolis, MN. For eighteen years she worked on stage, in commercials, industrial training films and did voice-overs for radio. During this time she became interested in the environmental movement and began working in the National Parks during the summers -- Isle Royale in Michigan, Guadalupe Mountains in Texas, Mesa Verde in Colorado, and then on the Natchez Trace Parkway in Mississippi.
Woven throughout these seemingly disparate careers was the written word. Nevada wrote and presented campfire stories, taught storytelling and was a travel writer and restaurant critic. Her first novel, Bitterweet was published in 1983. The Anna Pigeon series, featuring a female park ranger as the protagonist, started when she married her love of writing with her love of the wilderness, the summer she worked in west Texas. The first book, Track of the Cat, was brought to light in 1993 and won both the Agatha and Anthony awards for best first mystery. The series was well received and A Superior Death, loosely based on Nevada's experiences as a boat patrol ranger on Isle Royale in Lake Superior, was published in 1994. In 1995 Ill Wind came out. It was set in Mesa Verde, Colorado where Nevada worked as a law enforcement ranger for two seasons.
The rest is, shall we say, HISTORY! Nevada's books and accomplishments have become numerous and the presses continue to roll, so in the interest of NOT having to update this page, books, awards, status on the New York Times Best Seller List -- and more -- will be enumerated with the relevant books else where on this website.
