Black Woods, Blue Sky

Birdie’s keeping it together, of course she is. So she''s a little hungover sometimes on her shifts, and has to bring her daughter Emaleen to work while she waits tables at an Alaskan roadside lodge, but it''s a tough town to be a single mother and Emaleen never goes hungry. Still, she remembers happier times--trout fishing with her grandfather and hiking in the tundra--being free in the world of nature.; Arthur Neilsen is a soft-spoken recluse, with scars across his face, who brings Emaleen back to safety when she gets lost in the woods one day. He speaks with a strange cadence, appears in town only at the change of seasons, and most people avoid him. But for Birdie, he represents everything she’s ever longed for. He lives in a cabin in the mountains on the far side of the Wolverine River and tells Birdie about the caribou, marmots and wild sheep that share his untamed world. She falls in love with him and the land he knows so well. Against the warnings of those who care about her, Birdie moves to his isolated cabin. She and her daughter are alone with Arthur in a vast wilderness, hundreds of miles from roads, telephones, electricity or outside contact, but Birdie believes she has come prepared. She can start a fire and cook on a woodstove. She has her rifle and fishing rod. In the beginning, it is an idyllic life--the three of them catch salmon, pick berries and swim in sunlit waters. But soon Birdie realizes that she is not at all prepared for what lies ahead: Arthur harbors a dark secret unlike anything she’d ever imagined; and she learns that the Alaska wilderness is as mysterious and dangerous as it is beautiful. <Black Woods, Blue Sky <is a suspenseful novel with life-and-death stakes about the love between a mother and daughter, and about the lure of a wild life--about what we gain and what it might cost us....

Autorentext
Eowyn Ivey was raised in Alaska and continues to live there with her husband and two daughters. She worked for nearly a decade as a bookseller at independent Fireside Books in Palmer, Alaska, and prior to that as a reporter for the local newspaper, The Frontiersman.

Zusammenfassung
New York Times bestselling author Eowyn Ivey returns to the mythical Alaskan landscape of her Pulitzer Prize finalist The Snow Child with an unforgettable reimagining of Beauty and the Beast that asks the question: Can love save us from ourselves?

Birdie’s keeping it together; of course she is. So she’s a little hungover, sometimes, and she has to bring her daughter, Emaleen, to her job waiting tables at an Alaskan roadside lodge. It’s a tough place to be a single mother, but at least Emaleen never goes hungry. Still, Birdie can remember happier times from her youth, when she was free in the wilds of nature.

Arthur Neilsen, a soft-spoken and scarred recluse who appears in town only at the change of seasons, brings Emaleen back to safety when she gets lost in the woods. Most people avoid him, but to Birdie, he represents everything she’s ever longed for. She finds herself falling for Arthur and the land he knows so well.&#160;

Against the warnings of those who care about them, Birdie and Emaleen move to his isolated cabin in the mountains, on the far side of the Wolverine River.

It’s just the three of them in a vast wilderness, hundreds of miles from roads, telephones, electricity, and outside contact, but Birdie believes she has come prepared. At first, it’s idyllic: Together they catch salmon, pick berries, and swim in sunlit waters. But soon Birdie realizes that she is not at all ready for the dark secret that Arthur is harboring in the Alaskan wilderness that is as mysterious and dangerous as it is beautiful.&#160;

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