From the Archives, 1996: Death in Bondi smh.com.au - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from smh.com.au Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
often not just the name, but the e-mail address of the author. and mine was there. and over the next several days and weeks as it was repeated on c-span, i was on the receiving end of an avalanche of e-mails. and about half of them said that i was a traitor for writing this book, and about half of them said that this was a very important book to write. and in the middle of all of that came one e-mail from a woman in nicaragua, an american ex-pat living in nicaragua with her husband, and she said, you made a joke in that speech about butterflies and, in fact, i want to invite you to nicaragua where my husband and i have a butterfly reserve, and you ll see that, in fact, there is a book about butterflies that ought to be written. well, this is the kind of serendipity, of course, that is a great form for the muse to take, and i thought, well, that s nice, and put it aside. a couple of days later i looked at the e-mail again and was intrigued, how could i not be? and i wrote back