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Ellis Barstow, the protagonist in Nick Arvin 's most recent novel, is a reconstructionist an engineer who uses forensic analysis and simulation to piece together, in minute detail, what happened at a car crash site and why. The novel is based on Arvin's own experiences in the field of crash reconstruction: Arvin thus leads an unusual double-life as... a working mechanical engineer and a successful author of literary fiction. Following an introduction to Arvin's work from writer, friend, and fellow explorer of speculative landscapes Scott Geiger , Venue sat down with Arvin on the cozy couches of the Lighthouse Writers Workshop in Denver for an afternoon of conversation and car crash animations. Flipping open his laptop, Arvin began by showing us a "greatest hits" reel drawn from his own crash reconstruction experience. Watching the short, blocky animationsa semi-truck jack-knifing across the center line, an SUV rear-ending a silver compact car, before ricocheting backward into a telephone polewas surprisingly uncomfortable. As he hit play, each scene was both unspectacular and familiara rural two-lane highway in the rain, a suburban four-way stop surrounded by gas stations and fast-food franchisesyet, because we knew that an impact was inevitable, these everyday landscapes seemed freighted with both anticipation and tragedy. The animations incorporated multiple viewpoints, slowing and replaying the moment(s) of impact, and occasionally overlaying an arrow, scale, or trajectory trace. This layer of scientific explanation provided a jarring contrast to the violence of the collision itself and the resulting wreckageof lives, it was hard not to imagine, as well as the scattered vehicles. As we went on to discuss, it is precisely this disjuncturebetween the neat explanations provided by laws of physics and the random chaos of human motivation and behaviorthat The Reconstructionist takes as its territory. Our conversation ranged from the art of car crash forensics to the limits of causality and chance, via feral pigs, ...Read More