Q. Zia Summer is just hitting the book stands, and you're going off on tour next week to promote the book.

A. Yes, as a matter of fact, it was released this week, and I'll be in California, Colorado, Texas, Arizona, and also Chicago for the American Library Association Meeting.

Q. I think I might be the first person in Santa Fe to have bought it --

A. -- good --

Q. -- because it was just hitting the stores. In fact, they had to call me and tell me when they got it in. I noticed, because I read "Alburquerque" also, recently, that the two books happen along the same time line. There's a parallel story going on with the election of the mayor and the whole --

Q. -- well, I planned to write a quartet of novels, and "Alburquerque" was the first one, and that was published in 1972. It takes place in the spring in the city, here in Alburquerque. And then the second one takes place in the summer, which is called "Zia Summer", and it is a continuation of some of the themes, except that now in "Zia Summer" I have this very strong character that came to me, Sonny Baca, who's the main character, the private investigator in the novel, and just asked me to write his story. I had never written anything along the lines of a murder mystery, but I found him so appealing and so interesting, that's the way characters are. They appear and want their stories told. And I jumped into it and enjoyed, first of all, this kind of genre, although I hesitate to say that it's strictly a murder mystery. I find that I can still write a lot about things that interest me that have to do with culture and New Mexico and history, and the people that live here and the different groups and how we get along or how we don't get along in this genre the murder mystery.

Q. I've gotten a very great sense from you of your concern with tradition and culture, and they continue in this book. For me what I found very fascinating about all three books that I've read, "Bless Me, Ultima" and "Alburquerque" and "Zia Summer" is your -- how can I say it -- there's an argument -- not an argument, but a sort of philosophical discussion going on about good and evil. You bring in the Catholic religion, and yet, there's something much older too. It's this blending of the different religions and the character's questions about what is good, what is bad. You seem to be able to fit comfortably in the traditions and make them somehow agree with each other rather than to need to tear one or the other apart.

A. Well, I think the sense of synthesis that I seek when I look at my history and recognize that we have here in the New World, in the Americas a European history, but we also have a Native American indigenous history, and we're products of that, and we want to take from both worlds, so that instead of pushing one aside or believing only in one, there is beautiful material that comes to us from both worlds, especially that material that is spiritual and speaks to the soul, which Zia Summer is all about. It's about Sonny Baca's soul. How is it affected by the death of Gloria? How does her spirit enter him, and what is the role of the ?Currondera?, or the Healer, in terms of helping him understand who he is and how he can be affected by this woman's spirit? And that theme of healing, as you pointed out, is in all of my work. it starts with Bless Me, Ultima way back in 1972 and continues throughout the novels.

Q. I have a fascination with pre-patriarchal history, and the feminine aspects of spirituality. In your books you point the way, a lot of times, either towards these female characters who act in a nurturing way, or the "La Llorona". Is that something that you think of in terms of feminine and masculine, or do you tend to think of it just as part of a larger culture?

A. Well, I probably respond to the male and female sensibility that we all have and that we can all access in order to understand ourselves better. And it so happens that in Bless Me, Ultima the young boy, Antonio, has to have as a mentor a woman. The males in his life -- his father and his brothers can teach him about what it is like to be a male, you know. Can teach him -- initiate him into that kind of world. But it's also important if he's going to be a sensitive person that really understands himself and other people that he get another message, and that comes from Ultima, who is a healer, who is a woman, and so he begins to be in touch and to understand that world. And, again, instead of having them tear him apart, he brings them together. Twenty year later, or more now, Sonny Baca in "Zia Summer" is almost the same kind of person, as Antonia was in "Bless Me, Ultima." He's a young guy, he's thirty, he loves to have a good time, and loves to dance on Saturday nights, and he's got a very wonderful lady friend. And so on one level, he's a young man just having fun. On the other level is his need to know more about his spirit, and that will come from Rita, the lady friend that he has, and from Lorenza, the Currondera, that will begin to be very important in his mentorship.

Q. Is that coming up in the next book?

A. Her role will be stronger in the following novels. I plan to develop Sonny Baca as a person really in search of the meaning of life, you know. What is he doing here, and how does he bring together the worlds that he's heir to? That European world and that indigenous world and what kind of spiritual guideposts are there? What can he learn spiritually about himself? And a lot of that has to do with ?Don Liseo?, who's mentioned in Zia Summer, who's the old man who is also very wise and can teach him a lot, and the other part comes from the woman healer.

A. It was very interesting for me because he's about the same age as me in the book, and I lived in Albuquerque for seven years, from when I was seven until I was thirteen. It struck me -- there's a line in the book where you said basically we're all searching for an identity, and it struck me that I felt very much a part of that, when I was reading it. I was from an Anglo family. My father is Jewish and coming to New Mexico I tried to assimilate like everybody else. I think that's anothermajor theme in your books.

Q. I think one of the things we see going on in New Mexico and in -- really in this country, perhaps in the world, is that what we call the old traditional cultures that were land-based and had a deep sense of legend and story and mythology and spiritual thought and ceremonies and dances are in the midst of change. They're being displaced. They're being pushed out. We talk a lot about the process of assimilation how young people from one culture rush to seek another one and how this country's pop-culture, mainstream culture is so powerful that it draws these young people, and then they tend to forget their traditional ways. They forget their language, they forget their ceremonies, they forget a sense of respect for their elders and for the earth, and I think, in a way, Sonny Baca in Zia Summer is that kind of young man. He's gotten educated, he's got a degree, he tried to be a teacher, and didn't like it much and then went off to be a private investigator. But along the way he's lost touch with his roots, and to me those roots are really spiritual because what the traditional cultures teach us is a lot about our relationship to each other and our relationship to the universe. And when that is out of kilter -- when that is out of harmony, we get sick, and I think we see that sickness in our society. We see extreme violence in the home, in the streets, in government and the military, everywhere we turn. And so it's a question of trying to find one's roots that can center the person and make that person more aware of identity so that that person can act in a positive way in a society.

Q. Now when you pick something like the Zia sun symbol, in a lot of ways I think that embodied what you're talking about both in sense of what it represents in it's original meaning, and then also how it has been co-opted and used in so many different ways. It's almost like a symbol of everything that's happened to the young people and how something can be changed and used differently. People even forget what it even meant originally. It's on the state flag, and like you said in the book, it's on all sorts of company logos and all sorts of different things. Perhaps people see it but don't stop and give thought to what the symbol actually --

A. -- well I think you've touched on one of the very important themes of the novel and that is that the sun symbol is a sacred symbol, and as we forget that sense of the sacred and are drawn more into the world of the material, we lose touch with a very important aspect of ourselves, who we are as spiritually aware persons, and we have a past history that is full of beautiful myths and stories that talk about that spirituality, about that essence, and yet so much of it has been profaned, and so the book -- there is a battle between good and evil which also appeared in Bless Me, Ultima. What is it that happens to the sacred in life when it is profaned by the material, when it is covered over, when it is forgotten? Are we forgetting how to be descent human beings, you know, with a spirit within that we can share with each other and being swept more into this world of violence? So I think my novels are a very contemporary response to this question that we all live with. I live with it --

Q. -- right --

A. -- and everyone I though lives with it. It's a conflict, and it's a struggle. And so, as a writer, I put that struggle into the characters. In Zia Summer, I give it to Sonny Baca, and he has to deal with it.

Q. He has to struggle.

A. Right.

Q. It's interesting, also, the concept of Raven who is an evil character fighting for a good cause.

A. Raven has a hidden agenda.

Q. Right.

A. And that's the problem with evil that it shows up in all sorts of guises, you know. It shows up in fancy dresses, and as Don Eliseo says in the novel, "well we used to know who the witches in the neighborhood were because it was very common, we all lived together, and we knew who the healers were." And he says, now it's changed. Now they drive BMWs into work everyday and so the guise has changed, and I think if you continue reading the Sonny Baca versus Raven stories, you will begin to understand how Raven is for the destruction of the universe. That's his agenda. He represents that which wants to bring chaos. It's not a chaos out of which can be born something new and positive, but just violent chaos.

Q. Are you involved in some of these political activities here in terms of anti-nuclear sort of things and --

A. -- well I'm involved in a sense that I write about them. That's my involvement. If you mean am I out in the street when something like that happens, the answer is no. I have really decided that my contribution is through writing. I have a kind of limited time and energy, and I'm aware of social problems and social issues, and I speak to them, but all of it comes out in story form, let us say essays that I write. As a writer, I think that's my contribution.

Q. You've just completed another novel, I think you were saying, or you're almost finished.

A. Well Zia Summer is out this month, and then I have a short novella being published in the spring called, "Jalamanta", which is really a spiritual story of a prophet who returns to his village after thirty years of exile in the desert, and he returns to -- really to talk about the path of the sun, which is mentioned in Zia Summer, which begins to be mentioned as a way to journey through life. And Jalamanta speaks to the people about life and humanity and love and clarity of the soul and the path of the sun, and that's a short novella to be released in the spring of '96.