Locally Writ: Ian Pisarcik’s debut novel ‘Before Familiar Woods’ explores human relationships

Local author Ian Pisarcik’s debut novel, “Before Familiar Woods,” explores the consequences of avoiding people who fail to align with our preconceptions, particularly when it comes to children.

Growing up on the East Coast, in Connecticut’s Litchfield Hills, Pisarcik didn’t realize how unusual an environment he’d been raised in until settling into Spokane’s high-desert climate several years ago.

“The Litchfield Hills aren’t just rural, they’re also densely wooded,” Pisarcik said. The area is approximately 85% forest. “I think that has always impacted my understanding of the world as well as my writing.”

Fascinated by the influence of setting in literature, Pisarcik has always been especially attracted to authors who convey a deep sense of place in their writing.

“The first writers I really fell in love with had an (uncommon) ability to set their stories in very real places, writers that could show not only how people impact the place where they live, but even more so how their environment impacts them,” he said.

Pisarcik’s writing practice began in earnest during his final year of law school. “I found myself wanting to finish studying so that I could work on my own fiction writing,” he said. “That’s the way it’s been ever since.”

Now, as a legal writer and first-time father to a 6-month-old, making time to write has become more of an exercise in time management than it has ever been. He writes mostly in the early morning and late at night after his daughter falls asleep, but occasionally he’s able to fit a few minutes of editing in during the day while she naps.

“If there is a moment where I need to get some writing done and she’s awake, I’ll try to do that on paper,” Pisarcik said. “I don’t want my child to constantly see me with a screen in front of my face.”

Pisarcik’s debut novel, “Before Familiar Woods,” was released in late March. Set in the densely wooded fictional town of North Falls, Vermont, the mystery follows Ruth Fenn, a recently bereaved mother, and Milk Raymond, a soldier five days returned from a three-year deployment in Iraq, struggling to deal with the stress of parenting alone. The death of Fenn’s son, Matthew, is shrouded in malicious gossip. Raymond’s son, Daniel, seems like a stranger to him.

Amid all of this deeply personal angst, a greater mystery unfolds in the town. After the disappearance of her husband, Fenn begins to understand how far she had distanced herself from Matthew before his death; Raymond tries to avoid doing the same while his son is still alive.

Pisarcik’s writing process consists mainly of asking questions of his characters until he believes he knows them well enough to write their stories. In a first draft, those questions might be superficial, but by the time he reaches his second or third, his questions become increasingly complex and motivation-focused.

“The plot I don’t give a lot of thought to at first because I think that once you can create a character that’s complex enough, you can start to follow them around. They’ll lead you through the plot,” he said.

Once he’s written a solid draft filled with complex characters “moving through some sort of plot,” he reads the entire draft in search of patterns and themes. Only then will he start to develop those themes on a more conscious level.

“For me, this book has the trappings of a traditional mystery, but it’s really a character-driven novel,” he said. “It wrestles with issues like toxic masculinity, individualism, drug addiction and, most interesting for me, the importance of making an effort to engage with people who are different from us or who don’t meet our preconceptions about who or what they should be.”

Both of the novel’s main characters – Fenn and Raymond – find themselves up against what Pisarcik calls “a natural desire” to ignore and distance themselves from people they perceive as different. In both cases, that person is their child.

The book’s epigraph is taken from a song titled “Silence” by Tyler Childers. It reads, “Well silence is a mighty big grave, and whatever goes down there is as cold as the clay.”

“When we’re confronted with something we don’t understand, that makes us afraid,” Pisarcik said. “We tend to retreat into ourselves, growing colder in the process when, in truth, if we were to reach out and engage, we’d find a path to a better place.”