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UCLA English professor Claire McEachern is stepping away from her typical scholarly writing with “Coyotes and Culture: Essays from Old Malibu.”

McEachern, who has spent her career writing about 16th- and 17th-century British authors like John Milton and William Shakespeare, was caught in the middle of the Malibu Woolsey Fire in 2018. McEachern said her newest book “Coyotes and Culture” is a collection of personal essays that starts with her experiences in that fire. The book hit the shelves Sept. 16, and her first essay “The Fire Flies” was published in the Los Angeles Review of Books quarterly journal. Prior to the fire, McEachern said she had never considered writing for a general audience after decades of academic publishing.

“It (the fire) was a close call,” McEachern said. “The trauma of that experience led me to write it up. It was one of the ways I was trying to deal with it … I found I really enjoyed that kind of writing, and I wanted to do more of it.”

McEachern said the essays flowed quickly once she began writing. She added that the collection took shape over four years, primarily during the pandemic when she could not access archives for her academic work.

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Photo caption: Claire McEachern holds her collection of essays, “Coyotes and Culture,” as she leans against a brick wall. The UCLA English professor was inspired to write the stories by her time living in Malibu.

Photo credit: Victor Simoes/Daily Bruin