Leave it to Bryce
Towsley to turn social and economic collapse into what he calls “a rollicking
good read.”
Set partly in Vermont, THE 14th REINSTATED, the award-winning
author and photographer’s first novel, unveils a dark,
frightening vision of a world devastated by war, hardship, and unrest, in what
one reviewer calls, “a very gritty look at a future that seems more likely
every day.”
As Towsley’s hero battles to
protect his family and save the world from ultimate destruction, he faces his
share of knife fights, shoot outs, desperate chases, and encounters with pretty
girls in an action-packed novel that’s part prophecy, part commentary, and part
post-apocalyptic survival manual.
In fact, the avowed “gun nut,” who’s published thousands of articles and
six books of non-fiction, most on hunting and firearms, has just signed a
contract for a book tentatively titled, “Survival Guns for Preppers.” You could say he’s something of a spokesman
for self-reliance.
He’s
also an industry expert. Towsley brings almost 50 years of hunting experience
to his writing, having taken his first whitetail in Vermont in 1966 at the age
of 11 (check out his website for a dozen tips on rattling them, or for advice
on how to make an old rifle “look sexy”). Since then, he has hunted extensively
throughout the United States and Canada, and around the world, for a wide
variety of game.
A Life
Member of the National Rifle Association and a firearms consultant, Towsley has
competed in several shooting disciplines and is active in 3-gun shooting as
well as IDPA and USPSA,
organizations offering opportunities to engage in “practical” sporting uses of
handguns that incorporate simulated self-defense and real life scenarios.
When
he’s not traveling the globe, Towsley, the father of two grown children, lives
in the Clarendon, VT, with his wife, Robin, and several well-fed dogs.
You’ve made a life’s work of out of your love of hunting, and
have published many books and thousands of articles about the sport. How did
you get your start?
It’s more than a love of hunting. It’s
a love of writing as well. A lot of my contemporaries got into this business
because they loved hunting, shooting or guns, but they hate the writing. To be
truly successful as a writer you must enjoy writing. I don’t just write about
hunting, I cover a wide range of topics and genres. The key to writing well is
to love writing and to love what you are writing about.
How did I get started? I owe it all to
my wife, Robin. Before we were married I was working and living in Manchester
while she was staying in my place in Clarendon. I didn’t want to hit the bars
at night and get into trouble, so I took her old manual typewriter to my little
cabin on the Battenkill River and worked most of the winter on my first
article. That one sold and I never looked back.
I have always been a reader and
interested in guns and hunting. Like a lot of people, I thought I could do a
better job than a lot of the writers I was reading. That gave me a topic. Once
I discovered I liked to write, I branched out into other areas.
I get bored writing on just one thing,
so I like to reinvent myself often. I never abandon anything, but I keep adding
to the list. I write product reviews, adventure travel, technical articles, do
it yourself articles, humor, fiction, mood pieces, whatever is interesting at
the time and will sell.
Your work has taken you all over the world.
I have been in all 50 states. Most of
them many times. Also, every province in Canada except PEI. I’ve made multiple
trips to Mexico, including the jungles of the Yucatan. I have been to Argentina
and made nine trips to Africa including Zimbabwe, South Africa, Tanzania,
Namibia and short visits to Mozambique and Zambia. I have been to Russia and
much of Europe. Great Britain, Germany many times, Austria, Belgium, Greece,
and others including some offbeat places like Hungary and Lithuania. I have
visited Norway and Sweden. This fall I go to Poland. I have also been to
Turkey and United Arab Emirates.
I have backpacked in Yukon, where we
landed the Super Cub and walked for many miles to our location, carrying our
gear. I have camped out with the Eskimos in the winter in a tiny, unheated tent
above the Arctic Circle. I have stayed in a very remote cabin in Russia and
among the Aztec ruins in the Yucatan Peninsula. I have weathered killer storms
in Alaska, I have been chased by elephants, explored a jaguar den and been
stranded in Zimbabwe by an airline strike. I have seen seventy below zero wind
chills and have chased armed poachers in Africa. Lots of adventure.
Recently? I was in Zimbabwe last fall
where I’ve had a few exciting adventures with elephants and while tracking a
wounded cape buffalo. This spring, I stayed on a boat off the coast of Alaska
for a brown bear hunt, which was one of my most enjoyable trips.
Tell us about your work with the Benoit brothers.
The Benoits are a Vermont family of
hunters who are famous for tracking big whitetail bucks in the snow. Larry
Benoit was the first “hunting celebrity” and he pioneered the entire industry.
I was asked to write an article about
them by the editor of Deer and Deer Hunting Magazine back in the eighties. That
turned into a book, “Big Bucks the Benoit Way” which is the best-selling
whitetail deer hunting book in history. That led to a second, very successful
book, “Benoit Bucks.” Then we republished an updated version of the first book
called, “Big Bucks the Benoit Way Volume 2.”
You are a regular
contributor to American Hunter and Shooting Illustrated and American
Rifleman . . .
They are the top publications in their
fields. They are all NRA publications. American Hunter and American Rifleman
are membership magazines and Shooting Illustrated is a subscription and
newsstand driven magazine. American Rifleman is now one of the top 25 magazines
in the world in terms of circulation. They represent the pinnacle of my
markets, the best of the best and I worked very hard to become a field editor
for these prestigious magazines.
. . . and a consultant
for firearms companies. What does that work involve?
I am hired to consult on firearms,
ammo and accessories design. It is a sideline that has resulted from my
recognition as one of the leading experts in the field, a recognition that is
driven by my writing for the top magazines and publishing several books.
You’re also s a field editor for the National Rifle Association.
Tell me something about the NRA that will soothe my progressive, left leaning,
save-the-wolves soul.
The
way the NRA has been represented by the press and in today's society is unfair
and inaccurate. Politically, the NRA is a one-issue organization that is
dedicated to preserving our constitutionally guaranteed right to keep and bear
arms.
That
said, they do have a wide range of programs. The Eddie Eagle program has
taught millions of kids about gun safety. The NRA promotes competitive
shooting and has training programs for just about all aspects of gun ownership.
The list goes on.
The
people who run the NRA and the vast majority of the membership are some of the
finest people I know. They have high moral values and are American patriots who
believe strongly in the rights of the American people as detailed in our
constitution.
What advice do you have for parents of young
hunters?
The days you spend hunting with your
kids will be some of the best memories you will make with them. I have written
several 4,000 word articles on how to do it right, but the key is just do it.
Make it your “thing;” take the hunter safety course with them. Help them pick
out their gear and teach them how to use it safely. Butcher the deer, cook the
meat and eat the meal as a family. Make them part of the process, not an
addendum.
Tell us about your novel, THE 14th REINSTATED.
It’s set in Vermont after total social
and economic collapse. But, that’s a tool for the story. It’s an adventure
story. It’s a commentary on the folly of modern American society. It’s a
prepper’s manual. It’s a story that explores the value of family, friends,
values, morals, loyalty and most of the other important things that make us
human and shape our souls. It’s a story of betrayal and redemption. My gun guy
friends love it because I am one of the few authors who gets the technical gun
stuff right. Mostly, I just wanted it to be an entertaining story that will
suck you in and keep you up late at night because you have to find out what
happens next.
I was competing in the World
Championships of Shooting in West Virginia recently and I was sitting at a
table before the awards ceremony started when a woman came up and started
talking about the book. She told me how much she loved the book and then gave
me hell for not getting the next one out yet. She said that she had always read
the best books out loud to her husband because it was something they started
when they were dating and continue now, decades later. She said that this was
the book they both have enjoyed the most.
Then she told me a funny story about
reading the passage in which the character Mickey thinks he can hear a cow in
the woods, out loud in the Denver airport and about the stares and laughter it
caused. (It’s a funny passage, but the language is a bit blue.) She doesn’t
understand it, but that conversation was the best paycheck I have ever gotten
from any book.
I had more fun writing that book than
anything I have ever written. It’s been years since I woke up in the morning
with the feeling that I couldn’t wait to get to work. I felt that in the early
years and decades as a magazine writer, but after a while you have pretty much
written everything you needed to get on paper. This book brought that all back.
I really didn’t have a clue what was going to happen when I wrote that first
line and I had to get to the keyboard every day to find out what was going to
happen next.
I have studied a lot of writers and
everybody has a different approach to the craft. But the best novelists, those
who I gravitate to and love to read, all take this same approach. They don’t
outline, they don’t plan ahead other than in the most general terms, they just
sit down at the keyboard and let the novel buried in their lizard brains flow
out through their fingers. They often talk about being in the zone or in almost
a fugue state when writing and that’s what I experienced with much of that
book. For a writer, it’s the best high there is.
Do you consider yourself a prepper? Should we all be prepping?
It depends on how you define “prepper.”
I believe in being self-sufficient and in having the ability to manage your own
life. I can fix a truck, build a house or butcher a deer. I have the ability to
protect my family and my property from evil. I have studied history, human
nature and I keep an eye on what is happening in the world. Knowing what is
possible, I have made sure that we have the tools and the knowledge to survive
no matter what happens. I suppose some will call that prepping, but I call it
being smart about life. If you depend on others to solve all your problems you
leave yourself and those who depend on you vulnerable if those “others” are
suddenly gone for any reason. I think that is a foolish way to live your life.
I do believe that we are at a very
dangerous time in history. The odds still say that America will survive,
although I think it will look different in the years ahead. But if the worst
case scenario does happen, those who are prepared have the best chance of
survival.
We Americans have our heads buried in
the sand and we think it can’t happen here, but we are wrong. We have enemies
who wish us evil. Hurricane Katrina has shown how poorly prepared we are for a
major natural disaster. I have seen the results of economic collapse in places
like Zimbabwe and if you know anything at all about economics, you understand
that while we are taking a different road, we are heading to that same
destination. There are a lot of bad things lining up to change our way of life.
Those who can’t make it past next week
without a government check or a fully stocked grocery store are not going to do
well. Those who have learned to deal with life and have made some preparations
will be in a better position to survive.
Am I a prepper? Not in the sense that
the foolish and exploitive television shows define the word. But I am taking
steps to make sure we can survive if the world changes. But mostly it’s not
much different than how I have always lived my life. Prepping is a lifelong
process of learning how to do what needs to be done without turning to somebody
else to solve the problem.
Should you all be prepping? I think
that anybody who is not is a foolish person who does not understand reality.
Am I being too subtle here?
Who are some of your favorite authors?
Hemingway. I discovered him in my
twenties, I re-read him every decade. I come away with a much different
understanding each time.
Robert Ruark. He is famous with hunters
for a few books and a column he did for Field and Stream called the Old Man and
the Boy, but he did some great novels and was a famous newspaper writer back
when newspapers meant something. He is one of the best wordsmiths I have read
and it drives me crazy to read him and realize I can never be that good.
I read everything from junk to classic literature. On a bet a few years
ago, I kept track and I read 112 books that year. I appreciate any good
writing. Some of the best-selling authors are horrible and there are some
unknown, self-published writers who are brilliant. My favorite at any given
time is the writer who has my attention and is holding on to it tightly.
What’s next for you, in your writing life and travels?
Who knows for sure? That’s part of the
adventure. I just finalized a contract for a prepper’s gun book. I am working
on a collection of hunting adventure stories and on an outdoor humor book. Of
course, I am also writing a sequel to “The 14th Reinstated.” I have a few other
novels I want to write and several short stories, but the money making part of
this business, the magazine articles and the contracted books, take up too much
time.
For the travels? I have not been
to Australia and hope to address that flaw this year. Any trip that can take me
into wild places is always welcome. I love seeing the parts of the world most
tourists never see. Hunting has taken me into remote and wild lands, which I
love. The thrill of straddling a mountain top and realizing that you are on the
top or the world, or watching a hunting lion walk through the twilight just a
few feet from you are the moments that make life interesting.
I am traveling a lot now to national
and international shooting competitions, which are always fun, but the wild
places are still the best.
To answer your question, I don’t really
know what’s next in writing or travel. Life would be boring without surprises.
