Books

Three books flowed from one another – and then David Reynolds reinvented his writing career.  

His first book Swan River came from Reynolds’ childhood fascination with the fate of his father’s father, about whom no one spoke and of whom there were no photographs. As an adult, Reynolds discovered that his grandfather had travelled to and lived in Swan River, a remote town in northern Manitoba. 

On a trip to Swan River, Reynolds was surprised to learn about Highway (Route) 83, an old two-lane road which leads 2200 miles south from Swan River to the Mexican border at Brownsville, Texas.  He drove the 2200 miles of Highway 83 slowly and wrote a book about the road and the people he met along it.

The success of Slow Road to Brownsville led to a commission to drive across the United States from east to west on Highway 50, another old two-lane road, and to write Slow Road to San Francisco.

After three books involving travel, Reynolds turned to detective fiction, something that – as an admirer of Raymond Chandler, Sara Paretsky and James Lee Burke – he had long wanted to  pursue. The result was The Lady in the Park.