John Hartigan

As an anthropologist, John Hartigan Jr. has worked in Spain, Mexico, and Peru. As a novelist, he takes myths from these countries and applies them to our current crises, in hopes of generating imaginative responses. For The Last Cohort, he drew from colleagues’ research on ancient Mayan cosmology to depict what might happen if sacrificed Mayan warriors were resurrected, uploaded and modified by an AI, then turned loose online. This threat is met by a trio of grad students who find the precarity of academia as challenging as the perils they face in Xibalba, the Mayan Underworld.

Hartigan’s next novel is an epic about the Spanish Armada wrecking on the Irish coast in 1588. He started it in 2018, after finishing fieldwork in Galicia, Spain, then traveling to start another project in Galway, Ireland. He became intrigued by the deep mythical and spiritual ties between Ireland and Spain, which are rooted in a shared Celtic past. Between Wind & Water beguilingly blends fantasy and history, with moments of magical realism, grounded by gritty historical details and naturalist perspectives.