Jeff Lelek has lived on five continents and traveled in over 100 countries. During his college years at Dartmouth and the University of Montana, he worked as a geologist hunting gold and silver in Colorado and New Mexico. After several years mapping “hard rocks,” he switched to finding and producing oil and gas. Initially based in Denver, he led exploration efforts throughout the Rockies and the mid-continent before moving overseas. Since retiring, Lelek resides in the mountains of Colorado and the Sonoran Desert of Arizona.
His thriller “Sinai Surrender” was a finalist for a Colorado Authors League award.
SunLit: Tell us this book’s backstory. What inspired you to write it? Where did the story/theme originate?
Jeff Lelek: In college, I earned a liberal arts degree (major in geology) and read/wrote innumerable works. After pulling an all-nighter and writing 22 pages of iambic pentameter for a two-page assignment, I knew someday I would tackle a writing project.
Years later while commuting from Winnetka to downtown Chicago by the same train on which I heard Scott Turow wrote “Presumed Innocent,” I decided to take the plunge.
More than half of what I read is fiction, commonly featuring a lawyer or crime fighter. Almost never is the protagonist a geologist. Knowing the rich lives international explorationists can have, I decided to write a “bulk interest” novel starring a geologist on that train – 30 minutes in and 26 minutes out. I was transferred to Egypt before I could start an outline.
Fortunately, Egypt and other postings around the world provided abundant material to propel the Sinai Trilogy. The overall plot is made up, but the places/specific experiences/many people are very real, even down to an assassination and government corruption.
SunLit: Place this excerpt in context. How does it fit into the book as a whole? Why did you select it?
Lelek: This excerpt consists of parts of three chapters. I chose this medley to convey a sense of geographic scope, cultural diversity, and interlaced plots inherent in all three books of the Sinai Trilogy. My mission in writing the Trilogy was to create a gripping thriller, while imparting some understanding of geologic exploration, and to immerse the reader in various international and domestic settings in which I lived – to involve them with various places and peoples.
UNDERWRITTEN BY
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I hope the excerpt entices readers to want more; to explore the difficulties inherent in international exploration and find out what happens to my characters.
SunLit: Tell us about creating this book. What influences and/or experiences informed the project before you sat down to write?
Lelek: My academic training in geology was mostly focused on hard rocks (e.g. granites), geared towards exploring for precious and base metals – think gold, silver, copper. I worked several years in this area before switching to the oil and gas industry (involving sandstones and shales). I met, knew, and worked with many geologists who had incredibly interesting careers in far-away places.
My friends were kidnapped, shot at, and even killed overseas. Some contracted malaria, life-threatening dysentery, and parasites you’ve never heard of. Others got divorced, imprisoned, and one put on trial in Libya for murder. Most earned incredible memories, made precious friends from all religions and cultures, and raised their children to appreciate diversity and differences.
Although I “missed” the heyday of wandering into places like the Amazon or the Sahara with little more than a raft- or Jeep-load of supplies, I made it to my fair share of interesting and challenging spots. My exploits and those of my colleagues inspired many of the small subplots within the Sinai Trilogy; indeed many places (e.g. Siberia) exist as described, numerous characters (e.g. the bedouin) are patterned after actual people, and my depiction of colors, smells, and natural surroundings (e.g. the Bitterroot Valley of Montana) should bring the settings to life.
SunLit: What did the process of writing this book add to your knowledge and understanding of your craft and/or the subject matter?
“Sinai Surrender”
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Lelek: In today’s world, using web-based search engines makes research much easier than it was a couple decades ago. I frequently found interesting facts to incorporate in the story, and easily checked things for accuracy. This is not to say there are no problems in my books; some inaccuracies may have gotten past me, while others were intentional to emphasize a point (writer’s license).
I love the process of writing itself, finding it invigorating and relaxing. It’s fun weighing the alternatives of where a plot will go and choosing one path over another.
SunLit: What were the biggest challenges you faced in writing this book?
Lelek: “Sinai Prospect,” the first of the Trilogy, was initiated in 1992, while I spent several weeks on the GECO Beta, a seismic vessel acquiring data in the Gulf of Suez. The big challenge for this first book was finding time to write, given my demanding full-time job and a new family. I finally finished the writing just before retiring in 2010.
A bigger challenge was finding a publisher (didn’t happen) or an agent (didn’t happen). Fortunately, a family friend helped me format the manuscript and upload it into Amazon KDP – self publishing was accomplished in a relatively short time. The most challenging thing of all, though, was/is marketing. I have little interest in a website, Instagram, or social media – not much more in book signings (done a couple), award applications (this CAL award is the only one I’ve entered), or book tours.
SunLit: What’s the most important thing — a theme, lesson, emotion or realization — that readers should take from this book?
Lelek: I hope readers will come away with some small understanding of the long and tortuous process involved in getting gasoline into their car, natural gas into their house, plastics feedstock into virtually everything we use, or gold into their rings (not to mention lithium into their Teslas).
I am proud to have been a part of the oil and gas industry, an industry that helped lift billions around the world out of poverty and gave us the lifestyle we enjoy. It is a much-maligned industry today. Not to say it is without faults. Readers should take a look at “Unsettled” by Steven Koonin, or books/articles by Bjorn Lomborg if they are interested in the climate change topic.
SunLit: Is the international oil industry as corrupt/dangerous/nasty as portrayed?
Lelek: Yes and no. Clearly, all three books in the Sinai Trilogy are fiction – the overall story is fabricated. But… I have a friend who was kidnapped at gunpoint in Caracas and driven down a dirt road, let off and told to walk ahead – he survives to this day. I have another friend who headed a small company in Russia developing a gas field in eastern Siberia – one of his direct reports (a Russian) was found with two bullet holes in his head.
Another friend’s wife repatriated to Denver from Somalia and for the first year dove under the bed every night there was a thunderstorm. Some of the best friendships I made were with Egyptian colleagues in Cairo, where in the 1990s I rode my mountain bike everywhere in that city (something I would not do today). My boss at one time kept expat employees (not their wives and kids) in Cairo during one of the Israeli wars and was recognized by Sadat upon his repatriation – he was also in Iran when the Shah fell, hoping he eventually got his household goods sent back to him. These stories could go on and on – it’s a wild world out there.
SunLit: Tell us about your next project.
Lelek: The Sinai Trilogy was always meant to be an airplane read – a thriller to be enjoyed. It was never meant as a literary endeavor. At the very beginning I hoped it would be made into a blockbuster movie, potentially starring Tom Cruise. That hope still lives.
My next project, pondered during numerous hikes in the Rockies, will be more literary – more the kind of book read by book clubs and entered in award contests. It may or may not come about.
A few more quick questions
SunLit: Which do you enjoy more as you work on a book – writing or editing?
Lelek: I enjoy writing most, editing a bit less, publishing quite a bit less, and marketing not at all.
SunLit: What’s the first piece of writing – at any age – that you remember being proud of?
Lelek: In freshman English, chunking out 22 pages of iambic pentameter as an alternative ending to Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” assuming Adam did not take a bite of the apple.
SunLit: What three writers, from any era, would you invite over for a great discussion about literature and writing?
Lelek: Mark Twain, Hemingway, and Joseph Conrad – but there are so many others, but not Stephen King, who might be too scary.
SunLit: What does the current collection of books on your home shelves tell visitors about you?
Lelek: I read many genres.
SunLit: Soundtrack or silence? What’s the audio background that helps you write?
Lelek: Silence, or the sounds of the great outdoors.
SunLit: What music do you listen to for sheer enjoyment?
Lelek: While I enjoy virtually any live performance, I seldom turn on music. Bocelli, reggae, and top hits make me smile.
SunLit: What event, and at what age, convinced you that you wanted to be a writer?
Lelek: Reading Scott Turow’s “Presumed Innocent” on the commuter train in Chicago – made me want to put out a novel with a geologist as protagonist.
SunLit: Greatest writing fear?
Lelek: Don’t have one.
SunLit: Greatest writing satisfaction?
Lelek: When a friend/colleague tells me my writing made them remember something – like being in the airport in Cairo, wandering the Old City in Jerusalem, or banging on rocks in Wyoming.