Brian Payton

Who is Brian Payton?

Brian Payton is a writer of fiction and nonfiction.

Born in Los Angeles County in 1966, Payton lived in California, Illinois, Texas, New Mexico, and Alaska before settling in British Columbia at the age of 16. He was educated at the Seminary of Christ the King and the University of Victoria.

Payton’s first novel, Hail Mary Corner, is a coming-of-age tale based on his experience living among fellow seminarians and Benedictine monks. His nonfiction writing about adventure, wildlife, and the environment has appeared in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Boston Globe, Canadian Geographic,.

Shadow of the Bear: Travels in Vanishing Wilderness is published by Bloomsbury and Viking Press. A work of narrative nonfiction, it chronicles a personal search for the eight remaining bear species across continents, cultures, and memory.

Payton's book The Ice Passage: A True Story of Ambition, Disaster, and Endurance in the Arctic Wilderness, is a narrative nonfiction account of the final voyage of HMS Investigator.

His latest book, a novel, The Wind is Not a River is set in Alaska during the Japanese invasion of the Aleutian Islands of Attu and Kiska. The New York Times, in a review posted on January 31, 2014, called the book "gripping" and "meditative."