If you’re more of an audiobook person, I narrated the book myself, and you can buy the audiobook below.

BUY IT HERE

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Thirty states are currently categorized as 75% or above “abnormally Dry.”

These states include Florida, Georgia, Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, Idaho, Louisiana, Maine, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Oregon, Virginia, and Wyoming.

What’s striking to me about this list (which doesn’t include all states, you can find that list HERE) is the geographical breadth, spanning several regions. Most regions in the United States are experiencing some level of acute and prolonged drought.

The above map is for the week of April 21st. Here’s the breakdown:

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Before I get started, I want to thank for recommending Wilderness. They recently published a useful guide to the USFS reorganization, which you can access HERE.

This newsletter is written by me, River Selby, a neurodivergent and queer former wildland firefighter and hotshot, current researcher, and writer (I do not use AI to write, brainstorm, or research). I wrote a book called HOTSHOT, which details the seven years I spent working as a wildland firefighter. HOTSHOT is also a natural history of fire suppression through the lens of decolonization. It’s currently half-off, so now’s the time to get yourself (or your friend or family) a copy (or two). You’ll learn a lot about the history of fire suppression, including the development of these giant land management agencies.

Buy HOTSHOT For $13.50!

On Tuesday, March 31, with less than an hour’s prior notice, United States Forest Service employees were invited to an agenc…

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We’re gonna get in the weeds here, so hang in with me.

In the midst of this, the National Interagency Fire Center recently released its National Significant Wildland Fire Outlook for March-June 2026.

From the first paragraph:

“Fire activity remained at low levels across the U.S. in February but increased modestly the latter half of the month. The most notable increase in activity occurred in the Southern Area, which increased its geographic area preparedness level to three (on a scale of 1-5) February 24.

Other areas that had more modest increases in activity were the Northern Rockies, Rocky Mountain, Southwest, and Eastern Areas. However, the National …

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Before I begin, I’ll share that I’ve been awarded the Gerald Ensley Developing Writer Award for my book, Hotshot: A Life on Fire. You can currently buy Hotshot for half-off. George Saunders called it “A beautiful reflection on justice, the environment, the self, and much more.”

Buy Hotshot For $13.50

Fire and Land Policy Updates:

• Rangers in Australia are helping to shape the future of Indigenous fire.

• Forest thinning can help mitigate fire risks– we know that. But in this study, it’s also…

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According to a recent story reported by The Seattle Times, two wildland firefighters were arrested by federal agents while working on a fire in the Olympic Peninsula.

The fire is being managed by California Incident Management Team 7, who is rumored to have called ICE to a fire on the Sequoia National Forest in 2024. Every fire is managed by a specific Incident Management Team. During a recent briefing, personnel on the fire were told not to share any information about the incident with media or outsiders.

Here’s a video from the incident:

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The jargon associated with wildland fire and firefighting can be a barrier to understanding, especially for the general public. This season, I’m determined to translate things for my readers, while also maintaining an ease of reading for those who already know what I’m talking about. But also: Read my book and you’ll learn a lot more.

So: What’s PL4?

Last week the national fire preparedness went from level 3 to 4. This is on a scale of 5. What does this mean? Here’s a handy chart:

Fires start all the time. House fires, grass fires, forest fires. Fires of all sorts. Local agencies respond without incident. But as fire season picks up and overwhelms local resources, federal resources ar…

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First things first:

My debut memoir, Hotshot, will be released in less than six weeks(!). I’m both excited and terrified. You can preorder it here (or at your local indie, or Barnes & Noble, or wherever you’d like) and you can also enter to win a free copy on Goodreads. It also really helps if you add the book on Goodreads or share about it on social media (or in real life).

Learn More About Hotshot

I am also raffling off one signed copy of Hotshot to raise money for the Idaho firefighters involved in a recent horrific attack, which resulted in two lives lost. All you need to do is donate at least $10 to either of the GoFundMe campaigns linked below, send me a screenshot of your payment confirmation, and you’ll be entered into the raffle.

Idaho EMS Fundraiser

Idaho IAFF Fundraiserr

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It’s 2025. Men (and now women, including a pop star!) have ventured into space. Since the turn of the millennium climate change has accelerated, but the people in power seem focused on developing Artificial Intelligence and designing space ships so they can (perhaps) live on Mars, or some other planet.

According to this Earth Day Fact Sheet, we’re in the midst of a mass extinction which is, like climate change, accelerated (created??) by human activity. Animal populations have declined nearly 75% in the past 50 years– because of humans. Not to mention the humans who are adversely affected by other, wealthier humans. A while ago I wrote about how the world’s wealthiest people are essentially killing the rest of us because they just can’t quit fossil fuels. Or maybe they don’t want sustainability, because that would threaten their wealth and power? Read what I wrote here:

For Earth Day, I’m offering a simple list of things that shouldn’t exist. Let’s initiate a …

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In 1585, a British scientist named Thomas Hariot accompanied Sir Richard Grenville by ship, from Britain, to what is now known as South Carolina. They came by ship.

Britain was running out of resources, and resources, or what they called “commodities,” was what they wanted.

I invite you to read my deeply researched piece about this here:

Hariot, along with an accompanying artist, created a document called “A briefe and true report of the new found land of Virginia.”

Notice the words “new found.”

The land was not newly found, although this was their first time encountering the land. The Algonquin people lived there. Without their help, Hariot, Grenvi…

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That feels like an understatement. Things are weird in the U.S. right now, but it’s not only political weirdness or cultural weirdness. It’s also weather and nature. Fire and flowers both blooming out of season.

It’s not unusual for the Santa Anas to stoke fires in Southern California— the winds whoosh west from the Great Basin, gaining speed as they funnel through narrow canyons. This funneling also compresses the winds, raising temperatures and stripping them of any remaining moisture. Fine and medium fuels, like grass and brush, parch in the heat— the winds function like a giant blow-dryer and can result in single-digit humidity levels. Perfect for fires.

But in December? What was once a rare occurence is becoming more commonplace: December fires volatile enough to require evacuation orders, virulent enough to consume structures.

Students at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California spent last night sheltering in place as the fire roared outside. Luckily no struc…

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In elementary school, when I was a kid living in Washington state, I was taught the myth of a peaceful meal shared between pilgrims and Native Americans. Despite being surrounded by rich Native American cultures, my life rarely intersected with theirs, and the histories I learned were not real histories, but propaganda which papered over a violent past. I didn’t know I was living on stolen land.

Although I later learned that the story of Thanksgiving was indeed a myth, it wasn't until I delved into research for my forthcoming book, Hotshot, that I learned how insidious this myth is— how it represents a pattern of violence and gaslighting enacted by our federal government.

There is some truth to the myth: when Europeans first arrived in the …

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I am super excited to announce that my memoir, HOTSHOT, is officially forthcoming! The publication date is August 12, 2025.

In 2019 I was working 50 hours a week as a nanny in Seattle. I didn't have stable housing and my life was up in the air, but I spent the dark early mornings and all of my weekends working on a book proposal. Over the next nearly six(!) years this book was the only constant in my life. From Seattle to Czechia to pet-sitting in Europe, moving back to Seattle during Covid, nannying and freelancing and spinal surgery and moving to Florida and two and a half years of my PhD, I worked on writing and revising this book- the story of my life as a hotshot and the historical impacts of fire suppression in the United States. It's intimate, revealing, honest, and deeply researched.

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Grove Atlantic, my publisher, did such a wonderful job crafting the cover of my dreams. I never imagined I'd be on the cover of my own book- but there I am, standing in fron…

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When I began working as a hotshot in 2001, as a GS-3, my pay was about $10.50 an hour. Today, wildland firefighters at the GS-3 level are paid $11.95 an hour. That’s less than $2.00 more an hour that over TWO decades ago.

I worked in California, where I received a small cost of living boost, but that boost is negligible. Many federal wildland firefighters working throughout California cannot afford to live alone, and some can’t afford housing at all.

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Compared to state firefighters in California, their pay is abysmal. Check out the statistics here.

Federal agencies lament the firefighter shortage, but are unwilling to make permanent and necessary changes to firefighter pay. In the age of climate change, which is causing longer fire seasons and more volatile fires, both federal and state agencies rely more and more on incarcerated firefighters, who are often paid much less than federal firefighters.

Today I’m sharing an essay I wrote a…

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For the past three weeks, I’ve worked twelve-hour days on my final revisions. If all goes well, HOTSHOT will be published next summer. This book has taken me five years to write. It’s been a grueling process. I want to share what I’ve learned.

When I decided to go back to school after leaving my last fire job in Alaska, I never thought I’d write about fire. I honestly didn’t want to think about it at all. My experiences as a hotshot and wildland firefighter were varied, but some of them were terrible, especially because I was, so often, tokenized as the only femme on my crew, or one of two.

But during my MFA, one of my mentors asked me: why don’t you write about firefighting? It never occurred to me that people would be interested in hearing about my experiences.

I also never …

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For the past few years I’ve been doing archival research— an ongoing project of trying to trace my own white ancestry, the colonization of the United States, and specifically how (mis)conceptions of Native Americans evolved from European point of contact. As a white American, I think it’s essential for us to understand not only the history of our country but also our white history— what led us here. This history has everything to do with current land practices in the U.S., as well as current fire suppression policy. Today’s essay is part of that work.

The title of this post refers to the film Killers of the Flower Moon, rather than the book. And I d…

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I know it’s been radio silence here, and I’m sorry.

I’ve decided to pause paid subscriptions until January 1 2023.

As many of you may know, I have been working on a book about wildland fire and my time as a hotshot for several years. This process has been slow, stressful, and sometimes grueling. The publication date is now tentatively set to Spring 2025, and after two hectic revisions last year, both of them with intensely tight turnaround times, I am putting everything I have into one last big revision over the next four months. I’m also in the second year of my PhD, working on coursework. It’s a lot.

I also have another newsletter, Entropical Paradise. I’d like to somehow imagine a way of bringing these two newsletters together, but I can’t do much imagining outside of my revisions and course work.

I will be posting here— but I wanted to take the pressure off of myself by eliminating the sense of obligation that comes with having paying subscribers. Hopefully tha…

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I am so sorry I dropped off the face of the earth. I am still trying to find a balance between my newsletters, my book, my PhD program. I think about this newsletter a lot, but it’s like a snowball— once I don’t post I feel guilty for not posting and then I continue not to post.

My perfectionist tendencies can really work against me, because I often think that each newsletter has to be a perfectly encapsulated essay with everything thought out completely and tied up into a neat little bow. That can’t work with the pace of fires and climate change and ecology.

So, I’m going to share with you some things I’ve been thinking about lately.

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• This interview with author Jeff Goodell, who has a new book: The Heat Will Kill You First. The interview helped me understand that we are truly entering into, as Goodell calls it, a new climate regime. There is nowhere truly “safe” from climate change. He also addresses the dangerous feedback cycle of air conditioning, which is something I’ve been thinki…

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