Nursing career inspires novelist
Novato councilwoman shares passion for organ transplant world through novels
There wasn’t a better feeling for Amy Peele than calling her sick patients to tell them the good news — there was a organ waiting for them. It’s something she never got tired of doing in her 46-year nursing career, 35 of it in organ transplantation.
The longtime Novato resident got into the field at the University of Chicago in 1976 as a transplant coordinator, where she learned the ropes, from evaluating patients to be listed for a kidney transplant, to talking to donor families, to helicopter rides to get transplants, to working in the post-kidney transplant clinic.
The former president of the North American Transplant Coordinators Organization worked at the University of California, San Francisco, until her retirement in 2014.
Bit by the writing bug, she continues to bring awareness to organ transplantation through her fictional medical murder mysteries, the first, “Cut,” in 2017 followed by “Match,” which will be published in April.
Peele was elected to the Novato City Council in November 2019.
Q What made you want to take the University of Chicago job?
A Truthfully, I didn’t want that job. I was a nurse back then. I worked on the surgical floor, it had all kinds of experimental surgery patients on the floor. There was nursing shortage, so I worked a lot. I worked 16-hour days, every day, for like 10 months. On that floor was kidney transplant patients, so I really got into that, and I would go to the medical library and look them up so I knew what they were doing and how I could take care of them post-op. I quit after 10 months because I was burnt out, and I sent myself to Europe on a six-week backpacking trip. I came back and was working through the registry, and they said, “There’s a transplant coordinator position open.” My friends said, “Just go apply for the job.”
I go there and said this is what I think about kidney transplants, this is what I think about organ donation, which I had studied a little about because some were my patients, and he looked at me and said, “The job is yours if you want it.”
Q What compelled about the industry?
A I love to learn. It was like brain candy learning from Dr. Frank Stuart and following around the fellows and residents. The combination of the science and the personal stories, and this sacred space of donor families and seeing people get renewed life, I was off and running.
Q What stands out from that time?
A I would speak to the donor families about what they could do. It was a sacred space to be in, you have to be totally present in that space. I still remember some of the families. After the transplant I would write them a letter and tell them your son’s kidney went to a 21-year-old young mother of a 19-year-old girl, something general.
Q You wrote a memoir, “Aunt Mary’s Guide to Raising Children the Old Fashioned Way,” inspired by the stories you wrote in a College of Marin class. Did you plan on writing medical-themed books?
A No. I did everything I could not to write about it. I went to a mystery reading by Michael Connelly at Book Passage, my watering hole. They shaped my life in a way I would never have imagined. After he spoke, I was like, “I really like your books.” He had a heart transplant patient in one and I told him about my past and I said, “But, I don’t really want to write about that,” and he looked at me and said, “That’s too bad.” I thought, what’s that about?
Q Did you always want to be involved in government?
A That was not on my radar at all. I got approached by Supervisor Judy Arnold, whom I knew for forever. When the kids were little and in school at Loma Verde, the schools and teachers weren’t getting much money. I was talking to my mom and she said, “You just just you should just go to Sacramento,” so my friend and I went to. Arnold was working for state Sen. John Burton at the time, and Judy told us where his office is, and he gets us in to talk to Delaine Eastin, who was with education. I got to know Judy through that and ran into her at a big rally in front of City Hall for with the kids at the border and ICE. I later got an email from her, “You are the one.” I am grateful. I am a lifelong learner and I love to read, I love to understand, and I think that fuels my writing career and my councilmember career.