West Australian writer Tim Winton braves a barbaric and blistering future in his epic new novel 'Juice'. Photo: Supplied
Global warming isn't futuristic, says Tim Winton - it's here already.
The "terrifying feeling" of being under the sun at 50 degrees Celsius is something the Australian writer and climate activist knows from personal experience.
"We're not built to live like that and we won't. I'm afraid most of us won't live like that."
In his epic new novel Juice, the 64-year-old drops his readers into a dystopian desert culture where chaos reigns and life is cheap.
"Let's just hold our noses and go into this world for a while and see how it feels and see if there's anything we might learn from it," he tells RNZ's Saturday Morning.
Tim Winton: the reality of climate inaction is science fiction
For Winton, writing Juice was a way of synthesising the science, sociology and politics of global warming to help inform both himself and his readers.
It was "very psychologically wearing" immersing oneself in a brutal, overheated future for seven years, he says.
"You have to wholeheartedly imagine your way into that world and stay there long enough to be able to make it real to a reader. You go so far down the rabbit hole that you're dreaming about it as well. So it infects your dreams.
"I found it quite oppressive, to be honest. I keep thinking, wouldn't it be nice to have written a musical or something cheerful?"
Photo: Supplied
"A man down a mine shaft being held captive by a guy with a crossbow, yakking away to save his life" was Winton's opening concept for Juice, which is set in a stony desert.
This male character - "a middle-aged guy, looking a little worse for wear" - is guardian to a young girl, and the pair are fugitives.
After seeking safe shelter in an abandoned mine shaft, Winton says the man and child realise they're not alone and are taken prisoner.
"Essentially, the novel is the story told by this guy through a long day and a long night, telling stories to explain himself to give his bona fides and probably also to explain his own life to himself."
Juice's narrator reflects on his childhood in Western Australia and his beloved mother - "the uber-competent warrior mother who's appeared in my work before".
"Also he's telling the story to save his own life because he's pretty sure that if he can't get through to the guy who's taken him and the girl captive, he'll be killed come morning."
Readers of Juice shouldn't expect a happy ending, Winton says.
"The book, rather typically I'm afraid, ends on a knife's edge. I'm not really a provider of closure. I haven't been for my artistic life. I think it's a figment. I think it's a false consolation."
For Winton, Juice has a "defiantly hopeful" quality, despite the story world's harshness.
As an "activist in the shadows", Winton sees reasons to remain hopeful about what humanity can still action and achieve.
"Are we good enough for our moment? Are we going to screw this up? Are we going to lose the world on our watch? Are we going to consign our descendants to hell? Or are we better than that?
"I think the world is good and I think people are good. They are lazy and they've been trained to be passive because that's what suits the people who profit from our passivity.
"We all just want to go shopping and not confront that as a global culture - and as a species, we're on the razor's edge"
These days, Winton spends a bit of time wondering what the lives of his six grandkids and their own grandkids will be like.
"What we do now in the next six or seven years will probably determine the fate of the earth and for those who come after us - what kind of lives they can lead, how long their lives will be, what their birth weights will be, what their lifespan will be, what they'll eat, what the temperature of the world will be.
"It's hard to know which way we're going to go. My fervent hope and belief is that we will find ourselves, that we will do the right thing."