How did they create the storm?

It’s a combination of digital effects and shots in a huge soundstage. In a tank. It was amazing. Petersen said it’s the first time any of this has ever been done before. He feels it will actually be disturbing to people, it’s so real.

When the book came out, you said that for years the challenge had been to do what you’d finally done—get your writing published. Now the challenge was to hold on to life as you’d led it. How successful have you been at that?

The main thing I battle is the phone. So I haven’t been able to preserve my old life in the sense that I was a fairly solitary person whose contact with the outside world was, if not minimal, certainly suppressed a bit.

I’ve spent a lot of my life a little removed from society. That feels lost, and I want it back.