Pandemics, superbugs, ancient Antarctic bacteria: Vancouver novelist Daniel Kalla has imagined enough doomsday scenarios to be labelled an alarmist by some. But the author prefers to think of himself as simply a realist. “In the last 1,000 years, there have been pandemics every 30 to 40 years,” he says.

Not that he’s about to panic. “I’m not building a bunker in my backyard,” says the married father of two. What he is doing is writing science thrillers – one per year so far, with the fifth and latest, Cold Plague, having just appeared last month. Kalla’s publisher, the American house Forge/Tor, has been trying to brand him as a kind of Michael Crichton of the north; the jacket blurb for Cold Plague even calls the book a “microscopic Jurassic Park.”

Kalla has developed his writing career while maintaining a rather demanding day job: for 14 years he’s worked as an emergency-room doctor in a downtown Vancouver hospital. His moonlighting started with a night-school course in the late 1990s, leading to a co-written screenplay that was optioned but never produced, as well as a still-unpublished novel. (“That one will never see the light of day,” says Kalla. “I was definitely cutting my teeth on it.”)

By 2003, though, Kalla had managed to land an American deal; Forge released his debut, Pandemic, that year. “I got lucky,” Kalla explains. “I just started cold-calling American agents. I did know that my writing was commercial, and Canadian publishing houses don’t seem to be interested in that.” At the same time, Kalla – a lifelong British Columbian – notes with pride that his publisher has never pressured him to Americanize his work. His 2007 novel Blood Lies begins in Seattle and ends in Vancouver, “which wasn’t felt to be any kind of liability,” he says. “Also, they’re both cities that I know, so they’re easier to write about. Is that laziness or credibility?”

The new novel has neither an American nor Canadian backdrop: Cold Plague is set almost entirely in Europe. It’s also Kalla’s first “sequel,” bringing back Dr. Noah Haldane, the hero of the optioned-for-film Pandemic. “Sure, I’m ‘investing’ in my character – it only makes sense,” admits Kalla. Asked if she’d like to see the sleuthing scientist make more appearances, Kalla’s editor at Forge, Natalia Aponte, offers “a qualified yes, because we do understand that Dan has many plots and characters in development already for stories that certainly wouldn’t be Haldane territory, and he has our support on that.”

Indeed, Kalla’s already looking forward to the publication of his next book, which he describes as both “a departure and a compromise.” A departure because he wanted to write a historical novel, and a compromise because he acknowledges that Forge has “worked very hard to build me as a thriller writer.” So while The Hospital – the title is tentative, and Arthur Haley-inspired – is set in a fictionalized Mayo Clinic, detailing the century-old backstory of the institution’s founding, it also splits its timeline to deal with a modern-day medical crisis as well.

Despite the compromise, Kalla says there are still some negotiations ongoing with Forge. Although his agent, Henry Morrison, fully supports his itch to stretch, Kalla says the publisher “is worried about confusing readers by not providing a clear-cut niche.” Aponte doesn’t exactly disagree with that assessment: she says Forge wants to “make book buying easier for corporate buyers” (chains, that is) and to “give readers a sense of easily understood triangulation.” As in Michael Crichton + James Patterson = Daniel Kalla? “I don’t know,” Kalla laughs. “I don’t even read medical thrillers."

Still, Kalla is confident that The Hospital will see release in 2009. He calls Forge owner Tom Doherty a friend – “we just went skiing two weeks ago.” And if Kalla’s career continues its upswing, he may even start thinking about dropping that day job. “I talk about a five-year plan, but I’ve learned in this business to look far ahead and not take anything to the bank,” he says. Which means that for now, he’s sticking with the crazy hours, unpredictable sleep patterns, and adrenaline rushes. “Leaving the emergency room is not an economic option right now,” he says, “though in general, emergency medicine is a career for a younger individual…. I’m 41, and there’s a big physical difference from when I was 31.”