Black Woods, Blue Sky: A Novel

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist The Snow Child returns to the mythical landscapes of Alaska with an unforgettable dark fairy tale that asks the question: Can love save us from ourselves?

Six-year-old Emaleen loves standing at the edge of the forest in Alaska, imagining the witches and bears that might be watching her through the spruce trees. She is growing up in one of the most rugged, beautiful places in the world, but it isn’t an easy life. Her mother, Birdie, waits tables at a roadside lodge, parties too much, and is barely managing to support them both in a tough town.

When Arthur Neilsen comes to the roadside lodge, everything changes. He is a soft-spoken and scarred recluse who appears only at the change of the season. Most people avoid him, but Birdie is drawn to his deep knowledge of the land, his gentle nature, and the promise of a new life for herself and her daughter. Against the warnings of those who care about them, Birdie takes Emaleen and moves to his isolated cabin in the mountains, on the far side of the Wolverine River.

It’s just the three of them in the vast black woods, far from roads, telephones, electricity, and outside contact. And at first, it’s idyllic. Together they catch salmon, pick berries, and climb mountains so tall it’s as if they could touch the bright blue sky. But soon little Emaleen discovers that Arthur is something much more mysterious and dangerous than she could have ever imagined, and that like the Alaska wilderness, a fairy tale can be as dark as it is beautiful.

Black Woods, Blue Sky is a novel with life-and-death stakes, about the love between a daughter and mother, and the allure of a wild life—about what we gain and what it might cost us.

Story Locale:the Alaskan wilderness; the Pacific Northwest