From the pines to the page: Interlochen inspires novels by alumni, faculty, and former staff
Escape to the serenity of northern Michigan, relive the joy of creativity and connection, and explore powerful themes with books by Erika Randall, Howard Lovy, Dara Levan, and other Interlochen authors.
Snippets of symphonies soaring through the pines, dancers framed by the sparkling waves of Green Lake, the palpable synergy of collaboration—there’s truly no place quite like Interlochen.
Generations of students, faculty, and staff have been transformed by the unique atmosphere that exists between the lakes. For many, the inspiration they found here animates their creative process for years to come—and in some cases, sparks works inspired by our one-of-a-kind community.
In the past few years, several alumni, faculty, and former staff members have published novels set at or based on Interlochen. We caught up with a few of these authors to learn more about their books and the memories that inspired them.
A road trip of reconciliation and reclamation: Music for Leaving by Erika Randall
Erika Randall’s (IAC/NMC 88-89, IAA 89-91, IAC Fac 99-01, 03-06) passion for dance and love of language have always intertwined: Her first author bio, written when she was just five years old, read, “When Erika grows up, she would like to be a dancer and a writer. Her favorite color is blue.”
“All these things are true,” Randall said in a recent interview with Crescendo.
Amidst her thriving career as a dancer, choreographer, educator, and filmmaker—she currently serves as Professor of Dance and Interim Dean and Vice Provost of Undergraduate Education at the University of Colorado Boulder—Randall recently added ‘novelist’ to her list of titles with the release of Music for Leaving. Set in the 1960s, the novel follows 61-year-old Eleanor on a road trip of reconciliation and reclamation on Interstate 70.
“I began the novel after losing my dad and while pregnant with my son,” Randall said. “I was so full up with grief and longing and wonder that I needed to write it down. I spent every summer with my dad in Michigan, so I knew that the lakes and Camp had to hold a piece of my heroine’s heart.”
While every mile of the road trip is meaningful, Interlochen serves as a key destination.
“The notion of a one-woman road trip felt thrilling to me and anchored the memories and flashbacks, literally driving the narrative forward,” Randall said. “Eleanor is on the journey of a lifetime, and Lake Wahbekanetta felt like the perfect place for her to release some of the weight she is carrying. I set the story in the very early years of the Academy, but I imagined that the artists then acted much like we did in the 90s—so it’s a bit of a historical fiction look at those early years as seen more through my personal, but still fictional, retelling.”
Along the way, the objects around Eleanor—a peach pit, her engagement ring, her dashboard hula dancer—are given voice to reveal truths such as longing, relief, and hope. The hula dancer is inspired by a real-life figurine that accompanied Randall and her colleagues during her summers on Interlochen’s Camp dance faculty.
“The ‘girls of summer’ on the dance faculty had a hula mascot named Jeremy who bobbled along with us on the back country roads to Otter Creek,” Randall said. “I made a dance in 2003 called ‘The Secret Lives of Dashboard Hula Dancers.’ I was intrigued by how the hula dancer sits on the dash and only sees the past. I wanted to play with road trip music and time and space; this dance became the seed for Music for Leaving years later.”
Those acquainted with Interlochen’s campus and the surrounding area can expect to see familiar landmarks featured in the novel.
“As Camp faculty, stories of polka night at the Karlin Inn fill my memories, so I had to get that historic spot in there,” Randall said. “Music sung in practice rooms in the basement of TJ rings through the pages of this book—thank you to Havilah and Marie for your voices and how they held me through my years at the Academy and lift me up today.”
With Music for Leaving in the rearview mirror, Randall is looking forward to the next chapter in her multifaceted life.
“My cup is very full,” Randall said. “Dancing remains at my center, and I will teach ballet in the fall. I still wake up and write each morning and am working on a new book that weaves memoir, historical fiction, and fiction called Ladyhorse—hopefully out next year.”
As Randall continues her creative journey, Interlochen remains as close to her heart as it does to her fictional heroine’s.
“My time at Interlochen defined much of my interior life and self-knowing and shaped my exterior world of making, career, and friendship,” Randall said. “No one place means more to me. I found my voice at Interlochen—not just as an artist in dance classes with Sharon Randolph, or as a scholar in Destiny in Classical Literature with Howard Hintze or Civil War History with Scott Dean. I heard it in the snow-lonely woods where I first learned to be quiet and listen; in the sunlight spilling across the water, reminding me that I was all that I needed; in the late summer horn solo soaring through the pines, teaching me that I am enough.”
“There is no single memory that time travels me back to the north woods or the dance building or TJ…but just to think of the autumn dapple, the hot summers in the old and perfect dance building, the snow-covered paths to the chapel, and I am there,” Randall continues. “It’s not the times of performances or accolades, but the light and the humans: So many friendships, so much laughter, so much genius in our feral bodies and wild imaginations. So many who are still beloved—Kate, Danny, Marie, Havi, Sammy, 2e, Guy, Lito, Tymn, Jen, Kristina, Kristen, Justin, Shira, Steph, Maggie… the list goes on and on like the memories, friends collected from my teen years and then again when I was lucky enough to return.”
“I feel like one of my greatest blessings is not only knowing Interlochen in nostalgia as a girl, but returning and working there as an adult, knowing all of the sides and all of the stories, and loving it still.”
You can keep up with Randall’s latest projects on her website. Music for Leaving is available for purchase at IngramSpark, via Amazon, and at major booksellers, including Barnes & Noble and BAM!
Music, memory, and maturity: Found and Lost: The Jake and Cait Story by Howard Lovy
Former Interlochen Arts Camp counselor Howard Lovy (IAC St 84-85) has built a successful career as a journalist, nonfiction author, and book editor since leaving the Land of the Stately Pines. But after years of coaching other writers and penning stories about serious topics such as science, technology, and Jewish issues for notable publications such as Publishers Weekly, Longreads, and The Jerusalem Post, Lovy was ready to explore a new style of writing.
“I decided to step out of my comfort zone and try something different,” Lovy said. “I wanted to write a novel.”
Lovy found the inspiration for that novel, Found and Lost: The Jake and Cait Story, while training for the Sleeping Bear Half Marathon.
“The idea was simple: What if a song recorded 40 years ago accidentally went viral today, forcing two reluctant, middle-aged musicians into the spotlight?” Lovy said. “I was so excited about the plot that I ran home, told my wife I was writing a novel, and spent the next four or five months working on it every day.”
The book centers on two musicians—guitarist Jake and violinist Cait—who meet while working as summer camp counselors at Interlochen and quickly develop a romantic and creative relationship. Lovy describes it as, “a fun book filled with lots of music, even cameos from famous musicians, that I think would delight the Interlochen community of any era.”
“While the book is fiction, I drew heavily on my experience as a counselor at Interlochen—the musical setting and the emotions tied to those memories,” Lovy said. “We were completely immersed in music, and that atmosphere inspired me to imagine two characters, Jake and Cait, who meet there, fall in love, and create music together. Interlochen felt like the right place for their story to begin.”
Jake and Cait’s heady partnership is accelerated by the isolated environment of northern Michigan. Lovy has long been fascinated by the sense of detachment from everyday existence that many vacationers and Interlochen students feel during their time in the region.
“Interlochen has always felt like its own world—a bubble set apart from the rest of life,” Lovy said. “I spent my childhood vacationing in northern Michigan, and then two college summers as a Camp counselor at Interlochen. It was a place where I could live almost a different life before returning to my ‘real’ one. That sense of separation helped me imagine Jake and Cait—two characters from very different backgrounds who meet inside that bubble and explode with creativity. Removed from their usual surroundings, they’re free to connect, make music, and fall in love.”
Following the viral success of one of their decades-old songs, Jake and Cait reunite at Interlochen and find that both the place and the person they remember have changed. The ideas of the passage of time and our evolution through life experience are central themes in the book—themes inspired, in part, by Lovy’s own return to Interlochen.
“I moved to northern Michigan about 14 years ago, and as a journalist, I had the chance to revisit Interlochen for the first time since the 1980s,” Lovy said. “I found myself back on campus, but in a completely different role. At first, it was a little strange. I was seeing Interlochen through the prism of memory—this is where something happened when I was 18, that’s where something else happened when I was 19. It really made me reflect on the passage of time. That contrast between memory and present-day reality ended up sparking the idea of weaving those themes into the book.”
Jake and Cait, too, experience the tension between the Interlochen of the past and present when they return to campus as adults.
“Interlochen has changed—there are so many new buildings—but more importantly, it has aged through their eyes,” Lovy said. “As teenagers, it was a place of endless possibility. When they come back in middle age, it’s layered with bittersweet memories, shaped by everything they’ve been through. In that way, Interlochen becomes a character in the story—changing as they change.”
Although Lovy has moved on to other projects—he’s currently working on a nonfiction book about fighting antisemitism—he’s excited to continue writing fiction in the future.
“I discovered that fiction gave me a new way to say things I hadn’t been able to express through journalism,” Lovy said. “It was freeing. In this made-up world, I could explore real themes—religion, music, connection, fame, aging. These are truths shaped by my 59 years of experience, but expressed through an invented story. It’s a way of thinking I hadn’t done before.”
And as for Jake and Cait? Lovy isn’t quite finished with them.
“I have ideas for two more books set in what I’m calling the ‘Jake and Cait Universe,’” Lovy said. “There are still a lot of unanswered questions—like what really happened during their 40 years apart. It’s not exactly a prequel or a sequel. It’s more of a ‘middle-quel.’ I’m not ready to let them go yet.”
Want to learn more about Found and Lost: The Jake and Cait Story? Listen to Lovy’s interview with Interlochen Public Radio. The book is available for purchase through Vine Leaves Press and Amazon.
A journey of acceptance and awakening: It Could Be Worse by Dara Levan
Those who have spent a summer beneath the Stately Pines know that the true magic of Interlochen isn’t mastering an aria or staging a full-length operetta: It’s finding a supportive community where you are embraced and supported not just as an artist, but as a human.
Author, podcast host, and Interlochen Trustee Dara Levan (IAC/NMC 83-90) knows this well. An alumna of Interlochen Arts Camp, Levan fondly recalls the holistic experience she enjoyed during her many seasons as a dance and operetta student.
“The eight summers I spent at Interlochen imprinted on my heart and have influenced me as an author, podcast host, speaker, and mother,” Levan said. “Dude Stephenson taught me about Gilbert and Sullivan; he also shared profound life lessons both on and off the stage. The tears I shed at ‘Les Préludes’ I now understand weren’t just about feeling sad leaving a safe, nurturing space. My family jokes that Interlochen comes up in every conversation, and it's true! The majestic pines, the Melody Freeze, rehearsals at Kresge, lake water lapping the shoreline, and the experiences that are fostered by a kind, caring community. Most of all, the epic growth that happens when we leave where we're from and discover who we are.”
Levan tapped into her deep well of Interlochen memories to create Camp Intermezzo, the fictional Michigan music camp that serves as a key location in her debut novel It Could Be Worse. The book follows Allegra Gil, a woman who is forced to grapple with a shocking family secret after making a surprising discovery in a piano bench.
Allegra’s story of acceptance and awakening unfolds in both present-day scenes and flashbacks—including memories of Allegra’s summers at Camp Intermezzo.
“Allegra feels understood, seen, and accepted in all phases of her childhood as she discovers who she is while at camp,” Levan said. “Whether she’s insecure about her body image, nervous about performing onstage in front of her peers, or going to her first dance, some of Allegra’s experiences mirror my own journey. I hope the magic of Camp Intermezzo, inspired by my time at Interlochen, is a sensory, uplifting journey for readers.”
Levan has maintained a busy creative practice since publishing It Could Be Worse; she continues to host the podcast Every Soul Has a Story and contributed an essay to the USA Today best-selling collection On Being Jewish Now. Her second novel, Shaken to the Core, will be published with Regalo Press in June 2026.
“Like It Could Be Worse, my upcoming novel has a summer camp setting,” Levan said. “This time, it takes place in Vermont and explores how motherhood and mothering transcends biology.”
Levan also continues to be involved with the Interlochen community as the mother of a recent Interlochen Arts Academy graduate and current member of the Board of Trustees.
“A spectrum of hues from the past and present inspires and invigorates me,” Levan said. “It's the honor of a lifetime to now serve as a Trustee on our board. I'm deeply grateful to give back to this magical place that shaped who I am today.”
It Could Be Worse is available from Amazon, Walmart, Target, and at major booksellers including Barnes & Noble and BAM! See Levan’s website for more information and other places to purchase.
Additional reading: The Charlotte Holmes series and Sunrise Nights by Dr. Brittany Cavallaro
Alumna and current Interlochen Arts Academy Instructor of Creative Writing Dr. Brittany Cavallaro has drawn inspiration for several of her books from her time as both a student and an instructor at Interlochen. Her New York Times best-selling Charlotte Holmes series is set at a fictional boarding school—a nod to her own experience as a student at the Academy.
In 2024, Cavallaro and co-author Jeff Zentner released Sunrise Nights, a verse-and-prose novel about two students who meet on their final night at a summer arts camp. While the idea of sharing an impossible-feeling night with a stranger was inspired by the 1995 film Before Sunrise, the arts camp setting was based on Cavallaro’s summers as an instructor at Interlochen Arts Camp.
“It’s a book about making art despite adversity, and dealing with what it feels like to have a big change in your plans,” Cavallaro said in a 2024 interview about the book. “It’s also an ode to all my favorite indie movies where two characters spend two hours having the best conversation of their lives. I really wanted to write a book that felt like that.”
Have you read or written a book that mentions Interlochen? Let us know at content@interlochen.org.
