From his first thriller set in a northwoods resort paradise, Albert Lea native Roger Naylor has moved to the West Coast for his second novel.

Monday, August 27, 2001

From his first thriller set in a northwoods resort paradise, Albert Lea native Roger Naylor has moved to the West Coast for his second novel.

&uot;Ark II&uot; centers around Buck Barnum, a once-feisty freelance writer who has been down on his luck. He believes he has turned things around when he lands a job in public relations on a special, high-tech project for a Los Angeles shipyard.

But Buck runs up against powerful resistance spearheaded by an organized crime group. When it becomes clear that the opposition will resort to sabotage and murder to stop the project, Buck discovers which of his talents the company really bought -&160;his bulldoggish determination and his courage. Cast in the role of point man, he charges ahead, but with each step the stakes grow larger.

Naylor, who now lives in Laguna Woods, Calif., said he got the idea for centering his story around an incinerator ship -&160;an answer to the world’s burgeoning problem of hazardous waste disposal -&160;from his son-in-law. His son-in-law had been a chief engineer on a supertanker and tipped him off that there had actually been such two ships built -&160;at a cost of $37.5 million each.

The author said the Environmental Protection Agency was actually behind the project, and Naylor himself got to spend a day on one of the ships. One ship was to be docked in New Jersey, the other in Louisiana. &uot;But the green groups got involved, and people were saying they didn’t want that stuff coming through their communities – a not-in-my-backyard kind of thing,&uot; he said.

The project died, and eventually, the company went bankrupt, Naylor said. One ship was sold to a fish canning company for $5 million, and at last report, the other was still sitting in the harbor.

&uot;I really think it would have worked,&uot; Naylor said of the double-hulled ships. European countries had been doing a similar thing for years with converted oil tankers, he added.

Naylor said his first attempt at writing the book became overly technical, so he reworked it. &uot;It got harder to read than Tom Clancy,&uot; he said. He’s now happy with the result, he added.

He likes to place ordinary people in extraordinary situations, then sit back and see what they do, Naylor said, adding the protagonist isn’t like any one person he knows. &uot;I’m kind of a genetic engineer. I try to put together a likable personality who’s not quite perfect.&uot;

Naylor’s first thriller, &uot;Black Rock Bay,&uot; was released in early summer 2000. In &uot;Black Rock Bay,&uot; a beautiful north woods resort paradise becomes a battleground, when misguided patriotism and religious fervor mushroom from vandalism to assault and murder.

Naylor also co-authored &uot;California Trivia&uot; with friend and editorial associate, the late Lucy Poshek. It was released in 1999 and is a collection of over 1,200 interesting and sometimes humorous trivia items about California.

He has two other books ready to write, another thriller, and a story about P-38 pilots in new Guinea during World War II, &uot;A Paper Statue.&uot; The latter he actually had begun in the 1970s, but the timing was wrong because &uot;the Vietnam War had just ended, and nobody wanted to talk about war then,&uot; he said.

Through a neighbor he has joined an association of P-38 pilots who are all willing to tell their stories.

&uot;It’s a departure from what I have been doing,&uot; he said, but added that he again is placing ordinary people in extraordinary situations within the book.

&uot;In six months it should be done,&uot; he said.

At age 18, Naylor was married and a laborer at Wilson’s Meatpacking Co. At 23 he was the father of four children and had put himself through college in three years, while supporting his family by working as a performing musician (a member of The Korn Kobs), band instrument repairman, truck driver, house painter, and packinghouse worker.

Naylor went on to build a successful career over 27 years as a public school music director, guest conductor and clinician, professional performer, and arranger. He taught in Wells from 1959-65, and spent his last 16 years teaching and leading the community band in Bettendorf, Iowa.

He chose to leave music when the period of cutbacks in the arts began. He and his wife, Jeanne (Cady, a high school classmate), purchased and successfully revived Lakewood Lodge, a fishing resort on Big Sand Lake, during the next five years.

Moving to California in 1988, he advanced from a position as a proofreader for The PennySaver advertisement publication to supervisor for quality assurance in an aviation technical publication firm, then on to proofreader, editor, and finally chief editor for School Research and Service, a national educational research and publication corporation. But through what he calls his &uot;first four lives,&uot; he continued with his writing.

Since retiring to his &uot;fifth life,&uot; he has concentrated his efforts on publishing the three books and learning to play golf, an &uot;addiction&uot; for which he had previously never found time.

The Naylors plan to be in Albert Lea Sept. 13-15 to attend their 50-year class reunion.

&uot;Ark II&uot; can be ordered through most book stores and the following web sites: www.firstpublish.com and www.borders.com.