Goodreads asked Michael Norton:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

Michael Norton So how did this idea come to me? Well, unsurprisingly, it came to me on a hike. Well, really, during a series of lunchtime hikes around Traverse City. Hiking is a good thing to do when you’re a writer because it gives you time to think about things. And since I’m getting on in years, the afterlife is increasingly on my mind.

Over and over, this image kept coming back to me of a guy with a backpack standing at the bottom of a steep grass-covered hill – just standing there wondering what to do next. I’m a curious guy who always wants to know what’s around the next bend or over the next rise. So I had to write this book to find out what was on the other side of that hill.

As a writer, I was drawn to this idea of Purgatory as a place of pilgrimage and journeying. Heaven and hell are final destinations. But in Purgatory you’re still on the journey; you may know your final destination, but you don’t know how long it will take you to get there or what will happen to you along the way.

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