In his latest novel, 'The Sunken Fang Society," Dr. Ludwig Gutmann tells the story of a man bitten by a rattlesnake during a rattlesnake sacking competition that happened every summer in Morgantown, West Virginia for a number of years - up until 15 or so years ago, Gutmann estimates.
'It caught everybody's fancy, of course, because it was such an unusual event," he said.
Participants in the competition were expected to sack five rattlesnakes in the least amount of time. They couldn't hurt the snake and couldn't get bit. If you got bit and survived, you'd become a member of the sunken fang society and receive a patch - an unwanted patch that showed you lost and came close to dying.
'It was always the same story: bit on Sunday, home on Wednesday," Gutmann said. 'In the meantime you spent a couple of days in the ICU."
This is where Gutmann first discovered the phenomenon. He was a neurologist at West Virginia University at the time - now at University of Iowa - when he encountered a patient suffering from Myokymia, a neurological syndrome caused by rattlesnake toxin that results in twitching, 'jumpy" muscles that disappears 24 hours after treatment.
Both his first book, 'The Immobile Man," and his third, 'The Sunken Fang Society," each have stories with a 'medical twist." His latest, with 20 short stories, he said particularly focuses on 'how people can deal extraordinarily well with the challenging moments in their lives."
He often finds inspiration at work, which he attributes to doctor's 'privileged place" in society.
'They can wade into people's personal lives very quickly," he said. 'We're always sticking our noses into people's personal lives ...(we) really get to know people and some events are worth telling."
He fictionalizes his patients stories not only to protect their identity, but also to get important messages across.
'You know, when you read fiction ... there's always some non-fiction in the fiction," he said. 'Sometimes a lot of non-fiction."
Not all of his stories are fiction, however. His second book, 'Richard Road," is a non-fiction memoir of his experiences as a German immigrant.
'Though I don't feel like it, I'm a holocaust survivor," he said. 'My memories begin in the United States. I don't have any memories - or just vague ones - about being in Germany. I didn't feel the sense of turmoil and fear that my parents must have, except through the stories I heard."
His family made the decision to leave the country in 1937, despite the denial many Germans felt at the time. He was four years old.
'They didn't really believe the awfulness that happened or (that it) could ever happen in a civilized country like Germany," Gutmann said. 'You see some of those same awful events occur in countries where the level of sophistication isn't so high, particularly in Third World countries, but this was not a Third World country. This was the country of Beethoven ... but my parents saw it realistically and made the decision to leave while it was possible."
Though most of his relatives left, some did not make it out in time. His grandmother, who suffered from Alzheimer's disease and refused to leave, was one of many exterminated in concentration camps.
Understandably, his mother hated Germany. She hated the 'brutality and evilness" of the German government and the fact that the people of Germany didn't rise up against it.
'I grew up with that as standard dinner conversation," Gutmann said. 'She's never forgiven them."
The name Richard Road came from the street he grew up on and hints at the metaphorical 'road" from his immigration to attending Princeton University, which he says was the 'great goal" his parents always had for him and his brother.
'We had a pushy mother," he said with a laugh. 'I shouldn't say pushy. She was ambitious for her sons and was worried ... she wanted to be sure they had all the opportunities of any other American, so she shot for the top."
Gutmann graduated from Princeton in 1955, studied medicine at Columbia University until 1959, completed a residency in neurology at University of Wisconsin in 1963, served as a U.S. Air Force neurologist from 1963 to 1965 and did a fellowship in clinical neurophysiology at the Mayo Clinic from 1965 to 1966.
He was hired by West Virginia University (WVU) where he worked for 47 years. He helped establish the Department of Neurology, which he chaired for 28 years. In 2013, he became Professor Emeritus at WVU and moved to the University of Iowa.
He also received an honorary doctorate from the University of Mainz in Germany in 1993 and has published more than 170 articles in peer reviewed journals, in addition to his three books.
And yet, he still finds time for storytelling.
'I'm always thinking about stories ... but you have to sort of have the right mind-set," he said. 'I'm often putting the story together during the times that I'm biking or running and I can think these things through. The real problem is finding the time to sit down at the computer and write the story, but that's what I do on vacations and weekends."