The Steep Climes Quartet is a series that examines the near-future through 2050 consequences of climate change through the lens of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, where subtle and not-so-subtle consequences reveal the future world of climate crisis is already here.

Quotidian

quo-tid-i-an
kwō-ˈti-dē-ən

adjective

1. 1. 1. occurring every day

1. 1. 1. a.
         belonging to each day; everyday, as in “quotidian routine”
         b.
         commonplace, ordinary, as in “quotidian drabness”

noun

1. 1. 1. something (as an intermittent fever) that occurs each day

Having the climate crisis feel real in one’s day-to-day life is, I argue, an important prerequisite for an individual to take effective action. Even though we are steeped in the climate crisis, for most of us we can still too easily ignore it.

If I understand how democracy works, it is only when a sufficient number of individuals take action that significant change becomes likely. Considering the inertia in the form of economic interests—let’s mention here the fossil fuel industry and nations that deal in trillions of carbon dollars each year—it seems probable to me that successful climate crisis resolutions are going to have to push past of long-established and powerful self-interest-focused entities and this requires building a countering momentum in the form of huge numbers of individual. Is there a basis for optimism? Well, keep in mind, for example, that the current Republican House tried to tie the recent debt ceiling vote to agreements that would have severely undermined the Inflation Reduction Act’s climate change amelioration plans, which should make any person worry about our current politics stalling climate progress, but it is best not to lose hope.

Of course writing a series on climate crisis in its quotidian camouflage can be problematic for a novel’s need to be entertaining, and that’s why Kill Well and the other books of The Steep Climes Quartet carry the structure of thrillers. And when you think about it, the climate crisis is about as thrilling you can get for real life (i.e., existential)  drama, although not in a positive way, or as the old Chinese curse goes, May you live in interesting times.

The Steep Climes Quartet, Book One: Kill Well

Kill Well will be published on September 1, 2023

In Kill Well (The Steep Climes Quartet, Book One), Cynthia Wainwright was on her way to yet another fossil fuel divestment pitch, but now she is on the run. Her boss, a V.P. at Carbon’s End, is dead and someone is trying to make it look like she pulled the trigger. Panicked and terrified, Cynthia is on the run, moving in and out of disassociated states caused by a childhood trauma re-triggered by what she’s seen, obsessing to find a place she might be safe, and Great Barrington, in the Berkshires, has good memories for her.

Meeting sixty-one-year-old Davin Caine’s son, Jimmy, who is homeward bound on the North Shore Limited, Cynthia ends up at Davin’s Housatonic house, and a great news story for the interactive newspaper he has helped start lands in his lap.

On the other hand, a contract killer comes to the Berkshires, looking to finish the job of making it look like Cynthia is simply a suicide post-murder of her putative lover and boss.

The Steep Climes Quartet, Book Two: Dear Josephine

Dear Josephine will be published on February 2, 2024

Dear Josephine (The Steep Climes Quartet, Book Two) finds Davin Caine, now sixty-four years old, frustrated by the constant game of financial catch up he’s forced to play in order to keep his Berkshire County, Massachusetts, house, and high energy prices and jumps in costs for insurance policies are just the latest challenges. Davin must take on more paying work at the online newspaper service he helped design and spend less time in his art studio. Food prices too keep increasing because of adverse climate trends in some of the biggest food production sectors across the country, and his vegetable garden is more important than ever, as are the people who now share his house.

There are growing victories with climate change projects welcomed by Davin, but not so welcome are the costs that come with the budding number of such legislative initiatives, and the pending The Sea Wall Act legislation is one such enormous budget. In national news there is the story of a series of murders and a possible terrorist organization calling itself Kill the Rich, but it just may be that fossil fuel-funded operatives are using this as cover in the latest behind-the-scenes effort to influence and control The Sea Wall Act. Jeannie Louise Smythe, a national climate change politics expert who lives in Great Barrington, and her research collective, The Library, are applying AI to uncover sources of dark money, and this triggers a level of pushback that isn’t academic. And then Hurricane Josephine, the earliest and strongest on record, hits Florida’s Gold Coast, and the devastation of South Beach and the Miami Metro area and the count of the dead and displaced staggers the nation.

The Steep Climes Quartet, Book Three: Over Brooklyn Hills

Over Brooklyn Hills publication date, TBA

In Book Three of The Steep Climes Quartet, Over Brooklyn Hills, six years have passed since The Sea Wall Act was enacted thanks in part to the exposure of The Kehoe Institute’s criminal efforts to push the goals of an informal group of the extreme wealthy who hold vast fossil fuel interests.

For Davin Caine, now seventy years old, the economy finally has some bright spots, including ongoing renewable energy infrastructure programs that are relieving unemployment and chipping away at the country’s carbon footprint. But these efforts are expensive, and for many, including Davin, the cost of living remains expensive too.

It doesn’t help that China has grown belligerent as it tries to recover domestically from the worldwide recession, and a big point of contention is China’s hundreds of additional domestic and exported coal plants. The resulting economic sanctions against China are making that nation desperate to expand spheres of influence by any means necessary, and U.S. defense spending and debt are spiking yet again. Mass climate migration is adding fuel to the fire with border wars raging.

Even the Berkshires is having its own migration challenge with increasingly shocking numbers of young and economically marginal New York City residents trekking to the relatively cool hills of the Berkshires to escape a brutal summer in the city and the power cost demands for vital air conditioning. Great Barrington’s attempts to deal with an out-of-control housing crisis and spikes in crime results in an “us versus them” reactionary response, and civility and basic rights hang in the balance.

The Steep Climes Quartet, Book Four: Farm to Me

Farm to Me publication date, TBA

Twelve years after the events of the previous book, The Steep Climes Quartet, Book Four: Farm to Me, sees eighty-two-year-old Davin Caine losing sight of his dreams, literally, as his worsening macular degeneration is making it difficult for him to continue his art. Climbing all those stairs in his house in Housatonic is getting hard, and he’s having trouble believing he shouldn’t sell the house and studio and move somewhere more sensible.

Costs are still high but moderating as the clean energy infrastructure is driving down energy costs. Food costs—beyond what he needs out of his garden—are moderating too, at least locally, with more and more local farms in regenerative agricultural production as the movement toward local economy heats up.

But where there is business opportunity there is conflict, and Tri-Interactive, the expanded online news and information service Davin still occasionally consults for, has been hearing rumors about a play for consolidating the local food distribution business, and it’s looking more and more like extortion is becoming part of that play. It’s complicated for Davin because he’s long known Marion Fletcher-Gray from covering town politics over the years she’s been the Great Barrington town manager, but it looks like the town may be choosing the wrong side. Davin’s been mentoring some of the newly expanded Tri-Interactive staff of writers, and when the young reporter chasing a story about shifting affiliations among small food distribution companies dies in an unlikely accident, Davin finds himself caught up in a hometown conspiracy.