In the novel ARROYO CIRCLE, hoarding and homelessness are depicted through the dark marriage of environmental degradation and rampant capitalism. The story explores our collective role in the climate crisis through the lives of Shelley, a white, middle-aged handmaiden of a hoarder, and Les, an alcoholic, shape-shifting scientist, who lives in the creek bed behind Shelley’s house in Boulder, Colorado. As wildfires in the mountains fill the town with smoke, Shelley is confronted by gun-wielding police who believe she put a baby in the trunk of her car. In reality, it was a tub of kitty litter for the hoarder’s cat, a distraction from an unspeakable tragedy nearby. Shelley is so indignant about being wrongfully accused she winds up in the legal system, resulting in the fiery destruction of the hoarder’s house and occupants. Unemployable, Shelley rents out her home on Airbnb to survive. On rental days, she crashes on friends’ sofas, then, as the pandemic begins in late winter of 2020, she is forced to sleep in a garage. With coffee shops and the library shut down, the days become much harder, and everyone on the street is at high risk of Covid. All she has is Les, who spouts advice in a strange mix of quantum physics and Buddhism, teaching her about the healing powers of the natural world and the different meanings of home. They encounter a dazed, mystery woman obsessively walking through town, who, through the work of a single police officer, Shelley discovers has far more connection with that she can imagine. When the warm Chinook winds blows through the mountains and melts the heavy snows, everyone, including the police, has one shot at redemption.