- Author believes in writing from personal experience.
- From the Idaho State Journal - October, 11 2003
Kirby Jonas has been sprayed by a skunk, eaten a moose's nose and intentionally started a cow stampede to help himself describe situations in his western novels.
- Jonas, a Pocatello firefighter and author of seven Westerns, believes authors have no business writing about things they've never experienced, no matter how unpleasant they might be.
- His books, printed by his own publishing company, Howling Wolf Publishing, have sold 30,000 copies internationally and have earned him an income roughly equal to what he makes as a firefighter.
- He and 1960's Western actor Clint Walker will soon release a book together called "Yaqui Gold," in which the main character gets his feet skinned by Indians and has to crawl 150 miles through the desert.
- To understand his character's pain, Jonas, 38, crawled over gravel at Scout Mountain.
- In a book he wrote set in Pocatello and Soda Springs, "Death of an Eagle," he planned to have a character eat skunk and moose to prepare himself to live in the wild.
- A friend on the fire department trapped him a skunk which sprayed his firefighter's uniform. He never got to taste skunk, so he left it out of the book.
- "It was about six months before I could wear that uniform again," Jonas said.
- Another time, Jonas was out hiking and saw a herd of cows gathered near a fence. Since he planned to write about a cattle stampede, he snarled like a wolf to make them run.
- "The whole place exploded like you wouldn't believe. There was dust everywhere, and there was this rancher on the other side of the fence looking at me like I was crazy," Jonas said. "When I describe stampede's now, it's authentic."
- Before he joined the fire department about a decade ago, he worked three years as a Pocatello police officer. He said the experience helps him describe Western gun fights.
- "I've never had to shoot anybody, but there were several where I almost had to pull the trigger, so the feeling's there," Jonas said.
- Jonas, who grew up watching "Gun Smoke" and reading Louis L'Amour, spent one week on the No. 1 best seller's list with his book "Death of an Eagle."
- His most recent release, "The Devil's Blood," was a rewrite of his first book, The Season of the Vigilante.
- 20 Questions with Kirby Jonas
- ISJ: If you could have dinner with one famous person, who would it be?
- Jonas: Dead? John Wayne. Alive -- ah, nobody.
- ISJ: Who inspires you the most?
- Jonas: Clint Walker, cowboy actor.
- ISJ: Who is your ideal next-door-neighbor?
- Jonas: Jose Olano, the main character of my fourth book (Death of an Eagle); he can shoot the toes off a gnat, so I'd feel pretty safe...unless he got mad at me.
- ISJ: What's the heaviest peice of furniture in your house?
- Jonas: My log bed.
- ISJ: If you won the lottery, how would you spend the money?
- Jonas: Paying off my bills and traveling the world.
- ISJ: What was the last good book you read?
- Jonas: John Grisham's "The Firm."
- ISJ: What was your favorite vacation?
- Jonas: Yellowstone Park, my honeymoon week.
- ISJ: What's under your bed?
- Jonas: I'm afraid to look. I got bit last time.
- ISJ: What was the best piece of advise you ever received?
- Jonas: Don't quit your day job.
- ISJ: What's your favorite movie?
- Jonas: "Heaven Can Wait," Warren Beatty.
- ISJ: What's your guilty pleasure?
- Jonas: Dark Chocolate -- way dark.
- ISJ: What was the first album you ever owned?
- Jonas: "Cool Water," Sons of the Pioneers.
- ISJ: Favorite entertainer?
- Jonas: John Denver.
- ISJ: What is your ideal "last meal?"
- Jonas: Fried potatoes and salsa, corn on the cob, deer steak.
- ISJ: What's your greatest fear?
- Jonas: Drowning -- tried it once, wasn't fun.
- ISJ: What's your biggest pet peeve?
- Jonas: Overpaid athletes and actors.
- ISJ: How would you like to die?
- Jonas: Freezing to death in the Arctic tundra.
- ISJ: What would you like to be reincarnated as?
- Jonas: A golden eagle.
- ISJ: What's your motto?
- Jonas: If you love someone, tell them, everyday.