By Arden Spivack-Teather

Richmond District author Erin Van Rheenen has built her career on vivid depictions of life abroad. Fueled by several years living in Costa Rica, she started writing travel guides, familiarizing herself with the intricacies of each region. 

Her fiction debut, “You Could Be Happy Here,” will be released on Sept. 16 and published by Sibylline Press. The book melds her scientific background with meditations on the question, “Where does one truly belong?” 

Van Rheenen’s novel follows an eccentric main character named Lucy, who studies ecosystems to make sense of human behavior. After her mother’s death, Lucy travels to Costa Rica in search of her biological father. Upon arrival, Lucy is shocked to find that the idyllic paradise she imagined is a fantasy, with forest razing and hotel building consuming the village. Lucy feels untethered with little familial support, and conflict surrounding her inheritance tears what remains of her family apart. When she discovers that the grounding she seeks is holding her back, she immerses herself in Costa Rican culture and nature, discovering there are more ways of being than one could imagine. 

For Van Rheenen, Costa Rica provided an escape from the “punishing drive to succeed” that is prevalent in the United States. 

“Most Latin cultures value being over doing,” she said. “They value family, neighbors, relaxation – having a good time. Of course, they still want to accomplish things, but it’s not the same endless striving. When I stepped off the plane, it felt like there was more oxygen in the air.” 

That sense of reprieve became foundational for Lucy’s character, with Van Rheenen stressing the importance of her embodiment, a departure from American hustle culture. 

“I wanted her to feel in her body how different it was to live there,” Van Rheenen explained. “She rides horses on the beach, she swims, she goes on night hikes. She even flirts with someone by trading bird and insect facts. I wanted her to learn as much through her body as through her mind.” 

At the center of “You Could Be Happy Here” is what Van Rheenen refers to as richness, formed through the many adventures and discoveries modeled after Van Rheenen’s own time in Costa Rica. As she seeks to understand her family, Lucy turns to animals. To Van Rheenen, this instinct reflects a larger question of “What gives your life meaning?” 

“My character and I both like to look at how other species handle all these things that humans grapple with and come up with different answers,” she said. 

The parts of the novel most challenging to write, Van Rheenen admitted, were the intimate moments “where Lucy finally admitted to herself how much she loved her mother and needed her mother’s love, because she’d sort of separated from her, kind of out of self-protection. It was hard for her to be vulnerable, just as her creator has a hard time being vulnerable.” 

A takeaway of the novel is “Our world is bigger than you could imagine,” she said. “As soon as you start traveling, or even just looking at other cultures, you see that there are more ways of being than you ever thought possible. And if you look at animals, you realize there are more ways of being alive than humans have imagined.” 

When asked about the audience for her book, Van Rheenen cast a wide net and said she hopes “everyone finds something to love, but especially women interested in traveling alone, people who enjoy family sagas and readers who are drawn to nature and adventure.”

Van Rheenen hopes Lucy’s story resonates beyond just one family’s story. 

“It’s a struggle to see yourself and the world clearly, but it’s worth the effort to do so because once you have a more complicated vision of what your family is, what the world is, what your culture is, I just think you lead a richer life.” 

To Van Rheenen, fiction offers that richer life – the ability to see the world and one’s place in it differently. As she put it, “How far are you willing to go to find your true home?”

On Sept. 18, Van Rheenan will celebrate the debut of her book with a reading at 6:30 p.m. at Books Inc. on California and Locust Streets. For more information about events and how to purchase the novel, visit erinvanrheenen.com.