good afternoon everyone. welcome. my name is stuart landed and i'm the director of community engagement here at the cinema not be your host and moderator for this afternoon's program. thank you all forfo joining us. we are so happy that we are here and we hope you enjoyed the events with your timesse best-selling author abbott kahler at the 12th annual harrisburg book festival. some quick housekeeping notes before we get started. first of all thank you so much for making your way here to the cinema. for k those who are in the knowa couple of months ago we took some water in and had to take that moment to not only do some renovations for the flooding damage also to redo the lobbies of this coming friday october 18

we will have our grand reopening isn't that exciting >> a lobby with actual all the actual time.e. it's been a journey and we are appreciative of the hard work that the contractors are doing and our employees are doing to get ready for that big grand opening. for those whoho are members you will get free movies on friday to celebrate. are you those of you who aren't members as well and we have live music in on our new stage in the front lobby as well which is really exciting. lastly we encourage you to come away with a signed copy of "eden undone" after the event. abbott will be at the bookstore from 45:00 p.m. for assigning so book sales provided by midtown scholar bookstores a great partner of the cinema. it's my honor to introduce our

author today. abbott kahler is the best-selling author of american rows, tempter soldier spy and award for best fact crime and the novelve for u.n.. native philadelphia she lifted new york city and in greenport new york. she formerly wrote and her new book which we are here for today is called "eden undone" "a true story of sex, murder and utopia at the dawn of world war ii". hampton silos sides is right there's a dash of comrade darwin and robinson caruso and certainly more thanai that with of. "edenn undone" is mesmerizing ad completely tragic compellingly tragic. she confronts a truth about

civilization per twice a night we can't delude her own nature. hollywood has this copy and ron howard is adapting the theme story to the big screen in a movie called eden starring jude law which will come out in 2025. it's an honor to host abbott at the harrisburg book festival so without further ado please join me in giving her a warm round of applause. [applause] seem to think everybody for coming up s and thank you stuart for that introduction and i really appreciate your enthusiasm for the story in general. >> i can't tell you how many movies with jude law and it. he's done a lot of wonderful independent movies. let's jump right into it. in "eden undone" you focus on this group of eccentrics.

>> that's a kind word. >> i find immensely fascinating. they take a pilgrimage to the galapagos and what first sparked your interest >> i've been wanting to write the story for a very long time. i was one day scrolling through newspaper archive.com as writers do and i was looking for something else. i happened upon this tabloid passage headline that was so bizarre that i had to read it two or three times. to say that i actually read that or my hallucinating? and will read it to you so you can appreciate what i was thinking in that moment. 19 quarter and passage from the san francisco examiner quote was dr. ritter with this deal be poisoned in paradise works with baroness eloise known as ruled

the island with a gun murdered by one of her loves after she driven the other to his death and why is she going back to what she called volcano for. the mr. of the galapagos islands to the top at last does a record scratch moment where everything stopped around me and i banded any other idea was thinking about new this was the book i wanted too write. my publisher at the time said no we want american characters. i wrote other books in years past and finally i took out the publisher who published the book and just said this is a european story in american and the human story. who among us hasn't wanted to go somewhere and start anew and try something simpler and who wasn't -- who hasn't wanted to run from mistakes they made and start over.

to me it was a timeless human impulse. >> that headline introduces a lot of the characters as a cast of characters. if you haven't read the book you are in for a treat. they are absolutely bizarre humans. i would say they are all very human. they are not caricatures or anything like that so tell me a little bit about the characters in who the story centered on. >> we start with the doctor named frederic ritter a world war i veteran. after the war he went to work in a berlin hydrotherapeutic institute where they had some progressive ideas. raw food diets but he took it to an extreme. heum believed he'd didn't thinke needed teeth. he decided he was going to live

to be 150 are sold. he was a big tivo tayeb frederic machek and he did not trust civilization. he wanted to abandon civilization and go somewhere and hone hisl philosophical ideas. before he did did this so course he extracted all ofhi his teeth and had them replaced with a set of steel dentures which i want to say juvenile. and the sign above the adversaries to come he didn't account for the fact that his gums are going to shrink. anyway at the hospital he meets a woman who is 26 years26 old. she suffers from multiple sclerosis and every other doctor tells her can her condition is incurable except for frederic. he set a course you can cure this the power of your mind. if you speak it away you'll be

healed of course but she's intrigued by this partly because she was married to men she didn't love in her memoir which is remarkable published in 1935 she talked about how sex is and she's intrigued by this doctor and she begs him to let her accompany him to thehe galapagos so they can do this adventure together she writes in her memoir she thinks she she's the only woman whom frederic did not truly despise. so quite a ringing endorsement for their relationship. she's off to a good start. >> the cast of characters gets more and more intriguing. i want to know about the fairness is probably my favorite character.ti and her role in this bizarre narrative.

>> i think another family comes in things were calm but the tension is building in what could possibly go wrong next? the bear nasa ciancha to that question. when the story starts she's a vegan and she's living in paris. if you heard anything about the story for people at that heard it before she's always described as a self-proclaimed -- pro claim fairness. i looked looked into her with lineage and she's a true authentic bear nasa. it was quite aristocratic. she was a paris socialite. she was married to a french war hero f and she partied and he didn't really care. he was going to get rid of her at some point and she heard a voice telling her that she had

to go to the galapagos this galapagos island. she thought god was telling her to go to this island and become the the galapagos and press she had heard about fredericry and dori and the other people that were starting this island and decided to bombard her way they are. >> each one of these folks heads to laureano with the idea of building a utopia in each one of those in infidels has a different idea of what that means. how do you think seeking paradise can lead to such extreme outcomes as your title indicates? >> yeah utopias such a subjective term. i think it's also constantly in flux depending on what's happening to you. the bernahe shows up in her idea of utopia she announces to everybody to great dismay which is she wants it turned this tiny

island in the southern part of the galapagos into miami but she wants to make a miami resort to allure american tourist in frederic ritter who just wants to study philosophy and heinz whitmer is the quiet family living there are terrified about what she's going to do. she made no about the fact that she's not afraid to get what she wanted done. she carried a gun. >> she carries a gun and she carries a knife and a wet. various things happen in the book but she says that'ss her idea of utopia. she makes those plants andes announcesy that things start getting interesting for everybody. >> one of the first things i've read about the book before i actually read the book was it's

compared to agatha christie and i'm a huge agatha christie fans. i'm like i don't know. you did it. this is an awesome mystery and for me what was so fascinating as i have not read a ton of historical narrative nonfiction and you had to take thesece primary resources. here's my question. you have the elements of sex murder in mystery and then you have the history. how do you balance that when you're writing fiction like this i'm now about to become anything. often people lament that we can't make up dialogue and can't make up events. in this book all of the dead people did exactly what i wanted them to do fortunately. it doesn't always work out that

way. luckily i had the primary first material i needed to write it like a novel. when you have that kind of detail new have dialogue and people write memoirs and you have access to what they were thinking and what their facial expressions were and what their responses were two people and luckily the people in this book did t write memoirs that were vy intimate so i had wonderful access to those most interior thoughts in riding that the book. >> you had access to a lot of resources and you started with the headline on line and you were telling me earlier about these writings maccabees individuals who so long ago. what was the most surprising thing you uncovered and don't give anything away in a book of course. there were so many things. the depth of fear the people

started feeling when the fairness was escalating her antics and i should say her unbalanced behavior. frederic ritter and heinz whitmer the two men of the island who didn't really like each other banded together and said we need to take action here. they sent letters to the americanng explorer who are part of the book and say this is what's happening. if you hear of anything it's this woman's responsibility. we don'tto know what we are doi. are you going to come back and are you going to help us? they c would do the governor the galapagos invasively please come woman?d examine this she should be placed in a sanitarium and the course the governor of galapagos does come. there was kind of no winning for them in just the fear. you could feel the fear. in one case frederic ritter

wrote a lot of these letters by hand and you could see theer pencil breaking for he was -- the emotion was coming through and physically affecting him. >> okay so i read that you spoke to the governor yourself? >> how was that for you? >> poor me. i had to go to the galapagos islands for research. it takes two full days from new york city planes trains and automobiles to get there in the first place and laureano at the time of the people live there and 1930s was uninhabited. it was a daunting experience for them to know that we are going to try to do something that everyone else is literally failed at doing. about 150 people live there. there is spotty wi-fi. it's not a very island.

they only have one freshwater spring. there only two bars which is also a challenge. [laughter] >> i've been to both of them but it gave me an appreciation for how difficult it was in the 1930s to go there without any modern convenience and no pathways were cleared. they were packing away their own path tos. make a living situatin for themselves and especially dori. she's basically like what's wrong with your mind you are healedo al yet and very unsympathetic and these people were soch determined to do what they did. these people were very brave.

>> so florean it seems to me the island itself the character in the stories. and as you were reading these primary resources and stitching together the narrative here. tell me about how and what kind of character is florean? >> it's a dark theme and witchy. florean is a bit of a. it has incredible history the galapagos first colony so they are all kinds of nefarious characters. its first inhabitants was a pirate by the name of patric watkins and anyone who encountered him would say there

was a storm dripping from his body.ot the vermin were hanging off the hairs on him. he eventually murdered some captives they came to the island and he fled. in frederic and dori arere right there they stayed in theer pirae caves where patric lawson had flipped and she most of her time in florean. she was afraid to be murdered by the spirit of this pirate so it's a haunting opening. there's a pervasive sensews of fear. this is an int period of world history with the lead-up to the war. how did those historical markers affect the event of a new society that these folks are building? >> we started in 1929 right after the market crashed and the

global economy. is in power for the the characters was a high-ranking official new public and was desperate to flee germany partly because of that. yet many political enemies. so when they arrive on florean these external factors are happening around them. and it plays to what the american oak cord that these wealthy american explorers who were untouched by the great depression. they were fine and it's past time for wealthy americans during this period to build these enormous yachts like scientific floating laboratories and chartered exhibitions down to the galapagos islands together for f him, but when ths happened the first one i came down with me and by the name of mcdonnell.

he had no idea that florean was inhabited. when he goes back to united states he speaks about his discovery of a modern-day adam and eve which of course sets the stage for other people to start coming to florean and for the entire world to start paying attention to these eccentric characters on moglen. >> have a question about your process. having access to primary resources, reads like a novel and it's so cool. how do you structure a story without leaning too far? how do you build that? >> i am a outliner. i've -- my outline for this book was 140,000 words. don't worry you aren't getting a

warranty. but i carve the book of an outline an outline allows you to see where it can use fictionalize technique without breaking barriers of nonfiction to am not allowed to change chronology or fabricating the events.ow you think of foreshadowing. they didn't know that this was going to happen and it's a cliffhanger. >> of baronet shows up at your doorstep with a gun. that kind of thing. you can use the technique of fiction and it's wonderful when you find a bit of history that lends itself to that. >> if someone were interested in writing in this way we'll what would be some advice you give them? >> if you are reader for anybody

who's attempting to write a book reads in all genres. come up with a beginning middle and end in the stakes rising and the characters. make them come to life and one of my favorite writers always said with writers they keep playing the same record over and over but they land in a different place each time. you find what your niche is and they don't often vary too much. so i would just say to explore that. >> what do you think readers and we are going to give away the whodunit here but what do you think readers find most ?urprising >> one of the things, it's a fun

book. it's fun and what i want people to come away with is to have a a discussion about what happened. it's not often you get a whodunit murder mystery. there so many suspects and conflicting stories and that's one of the challenges ofk the book where were the two main characters memoirs. they withhold true then they lie and contradict each other and to me i always think what you choose to lie about says as much about you as your intentions. so to go and their memoirs and find out he was lying when and why were fascinating and i want readers to say here is my theory and have a debate about that. i think it's one of the most

fascinating murder mysteries of our time. >> he said was a fun book. frankly it's just wonderful. there's an upcoming film directed by ron howard based on the same historical story. how do you feel about the story making its way to the big-screen? >> i wish it were based on my book. i wish ron howard and i were close personal friends. what happened was i wanted to ride back this book for a long time and apparently ron howard has wanted to write a story for a long time. i just finished my novel got the news that ron howard was filming inis australia for the story starring jude law and so it was a moment where i had to quickly

finish my draft and every write and copy it and compile and notes and do it within the period of months. my update was 2025 so i tried to coincide with the movie. unfortunately there's no trailer yet and no release date yet. i hope people will read the true story. >> don't get me wrong i love a movies that a movie already. i was telling you earlier people are so strange and these characters are so awesome and you realize, i guess if you

hadn't to pick a favorite character is there one way you would choose out of this passolt? >> i've had to go at the baroness. i'm delighted to report she does feel the semblance of her hotel and called at the hacienda. one american tourist visit and cleared it with quote a festering sex complex. i don't think that's in the tripadvisor report. one of the things i adore doing about history are stories about women who have never come to light and possibly one of the most complicated ones. i wanted a real psychiatrist to readbeik the book and ask if thy

would diagnose her. she fascinated me as a feminist. she went after what she wanted. >> these characters face extreme circumstances and type of background in theater and one of the things when you're acting as you don't judge the character that you are playing because they don't think they are going to fail. for me when it comes to sympathy for character especially here and maybe with the dissolution that some of them had. do you feel sympathy for your characters even though her

violent outcomes? >> yeah absolutely. when you as much time with characters and i worked on it for a very long time and let me point out writing is a very solitary profession. often i will the entire day literally not speaking a word out loud andth the only people m talking for the dead people i'm writing a about. you become very close to them. they become dear to you in a way even though they are eccentric and have their flaws. when you have a chance to read people's writings and get access to their thoughts and to imagine how you might be in a situation that so extreme. i felt empathy and sympathy at least for the baroness and all of them at one time or another. >> i guess for me i really

enjoyed the industry of it and that's what it comes down to. what makes a good mystery? what for you makes a good mystery? >> you want a cast of characters where everybody is something. if you look at the comparisons and then there wereha none. it was an island mystery and even though they were not guilty of murder they were guilty of something. iof think the playing field that open it could go any way. it deserves a rich discussion and there is an allure and i think that's what you want. >> that's great. i want to go ahead and turn this to the audience to see if anyone has q any questions for abbott. there's a microphone right there and that would be great.

does anybody have any questions for abbott? [inaudible] and must be overwhelming. but the story toou show up or dd you have the molded and if you do mold it was there a lot of information you really wanted to get in there that didn't fit the storyline? statement that's a very good question. no. [laughter] eight people living on the tiny island so you will get petty squabbles. they are a bunch of those petty squabbles and the big dramatic murderous and mystery that we have this earthlike thing like you borrowed my donkey, i

didn't.. and you expect that kind of thing. i did a little bit of that to show the escalation of it. the animosity develops and as far as the stuff it's all in there. >> does anybody else have a question's? in the baroness. did the baroness have a memoir finish he did not have a memoir unfortunately. i would have loved to have got my hands on the baroness' memoir. >> had there have been other books about her or other articles was helpful to me.

i research in paris vienna researchers who all scoured large and small to see if there was any mention of the characters including the baron s. and to have someone go deep in her third genealogy for me. all that was very helpful in terms of the characters surrounded herself with men. she was a wonderful mythologize or an invented stories about herself. was this true? so is this true and to fact check or a little bit. not having her memoir i found that everything i could possibly find about her. >> how did you find the galapagos island maney why did they go they are? >> a a good question. if anyone knows anything about the galapagos it's not this tropical swinging palm tree

vegetation beautiful, exactly. no miami. it's this volcanic island covered in lava rocks very unappealing and not very. a lot of people who had been there before talk about it. the first record the new york zoological society said lucifer heaved up at bunch of rocks from why would they pick this? i think he said tonight be the uber mensch that he wanted too be. we go to the highlands we will have a good attempt at making a garden and having drinking water so they pick the one island that maybe they possibly could have sustained themselves on and it was a challenge but of course

they worked it out for a wild. >> and the fact that they came to the island beforehand. >> right before frederick and dori showed up their word group of norwegians trying tond settle their and they have built a little house on the day in the course by the time frederick and dori got there they had fled. >> dared great gothic ways to start theah book. >> how did you go about the process of determining is there enough material out their? and i'm curious if you ever found frustratingly there's not enough? >> adaptively happens alll the time. i have a folder full of story

ideas that i'll i'll never get what to do a book for because the research time isis not there and maybe it might make a good novel one day where i can fill in the blanks with my adaptations but i i won't feel i won't be a look call it a nonfictionyo book. everybody out there who wants to beta written about one day or write write memoirs and start writing them now so people can write about you a and 100 years and how great you are. are wonderful or whatever. we have these great memoirs for people who come after us. for this one i knew right away very quickly there were two great memoirs from two of the women. i said okay i did an archival search where you go to find your archival sources around the world and discovered there was a trove of archives at the university of southern california and the smithsonian institution.

especially the explorer george allan cohn pat -- george allan hancock who into the tar in los angeles. he was the most important explorer that would come to the galapagos during this time and files on these people including all the letters they had sent him. i got a sense of the oh i have this voice in this point of view in this point of view. i could see reports of their oppression. we got a bunch of different perspectives and you can make the narrative come together. >> any other questions? >> which of the three exiled groups did you find the most or entertaining or shocking to writed about and which one to d

find amusing? and they'll surprise me at different times for different reasons. let me start with the whitmer family. margaretet whitner -- margaret widmar it heard about dorian frederick and o wanted to follow in their footsteps. she was five months pregnant and this woman gave birth all alone at midnight in the dark surrounded by wild animals and the galapagos island where nobody was around. it's that act of bravery was astounding to me and really touching. her strength was incredible. of course doriann frederick what's -- dorian frederick what's surprising there frederick could be called to dori and dori get sick of it. this woman is like please let me accompany you and i'll do

anything i'll be your handmaiden by your side. she gets sick of him and starts acting interestingly in the baron s. 1 of my favorite things aboutt, her is according to margaret the woman who gave birth alone she said the baroness quote invited heinz and frederick were invited to her wigwam. at various times i think they took her up onio that. in the two guys that were with the baroness how long they put up with her. i'm only halfway through the book but did you get letters to support that from them or the memoirs? >> one of them without warrants the baroness had two that she came with her without warrants and robert phillips.

robert phillips and was her preferred. the man she r called her husband and rudolph was her and got demoted.he she would her time pitting these two men against each other. he would say i can't take this woman anymore as she did this and she did that and need to help me and get me back to germany and get me away from thisth line. their memoirs were contradictory. both of them report on how rudolph lawrence would show up and they -- describe the behavior he was enduring and hancock had he had written letters to haunt -- hancock. there are a couple of sources

for that but i don't know why he put up with her for so long. that's one of the mysteries. there's a recurring theme in the book and how they survived in different ways. you think these characters were doomed from the start or do you think they ever had a real chance of reaching the utopia they wanted so desperately? >> that's a very goodi question. the people whoer ride their for the purest reasons have the best chance and they are the ones without giving any spoilers, they are the ones who survive and endure. i think that story where the great things about dori i had to do a lot of foreshadowing is an author and she did all the war shadowing for that story. editor was like could you

please cuddeback dori's foreshadowing. she's dangerous around every w step.d she talks frequently about how people were there for the right reasons. people weren't there for the right reasons. >> survivor. >> the book is then compared survivor by "the wall street journal" and the "washington post."no if you are compared to survivor you know you've found an interesting piece of history. >> i'm so appreciative of your time. thank you so much to the harrisburg book festival and i'm thrilled to be a partner in that this year. everybody needs to get this book. it's a page turner, it's thrilling and as a fan i was happy to have it.

it was like having a new best friend to read. and thank you very much and thank you everybody for coming. [applause] my name is jason picked my name is bret park. my name is michael phelps. >> had have you apologized if it? would you like to do so now? you are on national television. would you like now to apologize

to the victim's? >> tonight all eyes are on iowa. >> i am suspending my campaign. >> it did not qualify for an insurrection. >> it's not how old we are but how old are our ideas? and without presidential immunity from criminal prosecution there can be no presidency as we know it. propublica lighthouse will not be jammed or forced into passing a foreign aid bill. same providing legal aid to ukraine right now is critically important. >> the bill is passed for declaring the office of speaker vows of representatives to be vacant. in the yeas or three feet nine day yeas or 43 with seven present and hopefully this is

the end of the personality politics. set this event is being televised live on c-span. >> for the next 90 minutes we will be like from a brand exhibition could welcome to the national book festival. >> with so great about c-span is to hit every film. this was a rigged trial the real verdict is going to be november 5. say we be well served to remember the longing cherished tradition have in this country is settling our political differences at the ballot box. today's decision almost certainly means there virtually no limit on what a president can do. >> look we finally beat medicare. >> they tried to push me out of the race. >> i'm staying in the race.

i want to speak to you tonight about lowering the temperature in our politics. >> it was a significant operational failure in decades. ♪♪ and i proudly accept your nomination for president of the united states. >> at decided the best way for us to pass the torch to a new generation. ♪♪ >> over 100 days before an election democrat party bosses forced joe biden off the ballot. >> there's no place in america for anti-semitism. >> we are here today to nominate

kamala harris. >> i accept your nomination. >> you know what that means. >> i'm talking now if you don't mind, please. does that sound familiar? she went out -- never touched by human hands. >> it falls into the general definition of fascism. >> there's literally a floating island of in the middle of the ocean right now. i think it's called puerto rico. thanks for being with us on election night. >> this will truly be the golden age of america. >> outcome of this election is not what we wanted to >> democrats are a few seats

short. >> the american people have spoken. >> it's the. >> gets a new day in united states senate and a new day in america. in many cases it's not a very nice world that it is a nice world today and i appreciate it very much. the transition will be as smooth as they can get and i very much appreciate it. >> thank you all.