David Darlington:  

Life Having lived in northern California for almost 30 years (math whizzes will compute that that's longer than I lived on the East Coast), I'm now forced to call myself a dyed-in-the-wool West Coast type. A freelance writer my entire adult life, I published four books between 1987 and 1997: "In Condor Country," "Angels' Visits" (now retitled "Zin"), "The Mojave," and "Area 51: The Dreamland Chronicles"; all were critically well received but unimpressive in the sales department, so -- as mainstream publishing has changed so much since I started out, heading inexorably toward the commercial-blockbuster orientation -- I've been on hiatus from that path for the past several years, doing only occasional magazine and newspaper work. In recent times I've styled myself a wine writer (I currently write a back-page column for Wine & Spirits Magazine), an avocation encouraged by residency in the San Francisco Bay Area. Frankly, though, more of my energy of late has gone into rehabilitating a piece of property that I and my significant other, Leigh Lightfoot (ex-dancer/choreographer, now teacher and psychotherapist) have procured near the town of Willits in Mendocino County. It consists of five acres at the end of a dirt road on the transitional border between a quiet agricultural valley and the mountains of Mendocino National Forest. Quite a change from the urban scene in Berkeley and, since much of my satisfaction in life derives from experiences in the natural world, a very welcome one. It's also put me back in touch with the carpentry and manual-labor skills through which I made a modest living for some years after college -- for example, I've just finished paneling the ceiling of a cabin with old-growth 1x12 redwood recycled from a chic...Expand for more