The Canal: It's For Real

The Canal was inspired by a real place -- the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn, New York. At the time that I was living in Brooklyn, the Gowanus had improved somewhat from it’s earlier and more neglected days, but a lot of the details pertaining to the canal in the book did at one time apply to the actual Gowanus. The canal reeking in the summer: I did not make that up. Nor the sewage or the industrial pollution. The flushing tunnel I mention also exists, and the book takes place in the decade previous