Wilderness Fiction

Sefia knows what it means to survive. After her father is brutally murdered, she flees into the wilderness with her aunt Nin, who teaches her to hunt, track, and steal. But when Nin is kidnapped, leaving Sefia completely alone, none of her survival skills can help her discover where Nin's been taken, or if she's even alive. The only clue to both her aunt's disappearance and her father's murder is the odd rectangular object her father left behind, an object she comes to realize is a book - an item unheard of in her illiterate society.

Weaving a tapestry of history, romance, and adventure, this epic novel sweeps us into an awe-inspiring, heart-stopping story of love and survival in an emerging America. It is spring 1797. Dreaming of building a better life, Stephen and Jane Wyllie set out across the American frontier in search of a place to call home in a land of savage beauty. With undaunted courage and boundless daring, Stephen, along with his five brothers, bravely plunges toward a wilderness full of terror.

"You'll never make it!" With encouragement like that, author Mickey Thomas, in a fit of youthful testosterone, and with meticulous inattention to detail, decided to embark on a once-in-a lifetime 3,400-mile bicycle trek from Montana to Alaska. While riding through knee problems, illness, homesickness, infatuation, bad weather, and meeting a host of quirky and hilarious characters, Mickey, and his group rides over some of the roughest roads and most desolate scenery in North America. Along the way, he discovers an inner strength as well as a new physical stamina he never had.

Evelyn King longs to marry the man she loves. She won't let anything stand in her way. But the frontier is a dangerous place. Killers and hostiles and beasts abound. As Evelyn is reminded when she and her beloved become the prey of two-legged wolves—and something far worse.

Mallory Reynolds is a driven woman fueled by her passion for photographing wild animals in remote locations. Every year she makes a trek deep into Alaska, but this time the unthinkable happens: she crash-lands after her plane stalls out in a storm. Injured, vulnerable, and threatened by the very creatures she loves, Mallory fears the worst - until she’s rescued by Michael Bradley, a mysterious mountain man living in self-imposed exile. Unfortunately, neither of them can leave Michael’s secluded cabin until spring. Mallory’s stuck with a stranger for months.

A plague has devastated the land. Bloodthirsty creatures stalk the night. A loose band of survivors fight for their lives. Can they make it through? And what will become of them if they do?

After inheriting his uncle’s lodge, Silas Matheson hopes the grandeur of the California Sierra Nevada will be a fresh start for his two young sons, and a chance to finally face his demons. It was here, fifteen years ago, that Silas and his friends Jessica, Danny, and Meg ventured into the mountain wilderness and Jessica vanished without a trace. When his boys go missing in the same dark woods, the fear and guilt that Silas has been running from ever since come crashing back.

Caleb Jackson is on a journey. And not just the mission he and his friends have embarked on to fetch the Nez Perce chief’s runaway daughter. Otskai is eager to take on a challenge. She’s lived under the shelter of other’s choices her entire life, especially when she was betrothed to one of the village braves at the tender age of eight. Now with her husband's death, she’s finally found the freedom she always craved - even with a two-year-old to raise.

What are the politics of nature? Who owns it, where is it, what role does it play in our lives? Does it need to be tamed? Are we ourselves natural? In A Darker Wilderness, a constellation of luminary writers reflect on the significance of nature in their lived experience and on the role of nature in the lives of Black folks in the United States. Each of these essays engages with a single archival object, whether directly or obliquely, exploring stories spanning hundreds of years and thousands of miles, traveling from roots to space and finding rich Blackness everywhere.

Legendary mountain man Shakespeare McNair has seen enough winters in the wilderness to know when something isn't right. And beneath the waters of the lake near his new home, something is definitely off. Nate King and his family can see it, too - waves without any wind to create them, a huge force that pulls a fishing pole right from Evelyn King's hands, something malevolent out there...watching them. Shakespeare knows it's just a matter of time before the creature hurts someone. But he's not going to wait around. He's going to go after it himself, even knowing he might not come back.

When Nate King and his family hold a cabin raising for new neighbors in their remote valley, they come face-to-face with a new kind of enemy — one that strikes terror into their hearts.

In the 1880s, Stanislas (Stas) Tarkowski, a 14-year-old Polish boy, and Nell Rawlinson, an eight-year-old English girl, live in Port Said, Egypt, while their widowed fathers work as engineers on the Suez Canal. When their fathers are away, Stas and Nell are kidnapped by Arabs as part of a rebellion against British rule. Once captured, the children are forced to travel through the Sahara Desert, and they face all manner of obstacles, from heat and hunger to disease and deadly animals.

After a long winter in the remote Teton Mountains, Anna Porter is convinced that she's not cut out for wilderness living. Her heart yearns for a place where she'll feel at home, and she's ready to continue the journey she started a year ago along the Oregon Trail. Without an escort, she may be forced to marry a stranger out of necessity, until the least likely man agrees to accompany her.

Though living on the frontier was deadly, the reward for the hardy souls brave enough to take the risk was unlimited freedom—freedom that murderous renegades would steal for a few pieces of gold. When mountain man Nathaniel King and his family were threatened by a band of slavers, they faced enemies like none they'd ever battled.

Strong mountain men like Nate King risked everything to carve a new world from the frontier, and they weren't about to give it up without a fight. But when some friendly Crows asked Nate to help them rescue a missing girl from a band of murderous Lakota, he set off on a journey that would take him to the end of the trail - and possibly the end of his life.

When Nate King comes along a pair of green would-be trappers from New York, he is only too glad to risk his life to save them from a Piegan war party. It's only after he takes them into his own cabin that he realizes that they would repay his kindness with betrayal.

Gold Dust Fever! Penniless old trapper Ben Frazier is just about ready to pack it all in when an Arapaho warrior takes pity on him and shows him where to find the elusive gold that white men value so greatly. His problems seem to be over, but then another band of trappers finds out about the gold and force Ben to lead them to it. It’s up to Zach King to save the old man, but can he survive a fight against a gang of gold-crazed mountain men?

The unforgiving wilderness of the Rocky Mountains forced a boy to grow up fast, so Nate King taught his son, Zach, how to survive the constant hazards and hardships--and he taught him well. With an Indian war party on the prowl and a marauding grizzly on the loose, young Zach was about to face the test of his life, with no room for failure. But there was one danger Nate hadn't prepared Zach for--a beautiful girl with blue eyes.

The brutal wilderness of the Rocky Mountains can be deadly to those unaccustomed to its dangers. So when a clan of travelers from the hill country back East arrive at Nate King's part of the mountain, Nate is more than willing to lend a hand and show them some hospitality. He has no way of knowing that this clan is used to fighting--and killing--for what they want. And they want Nate's land for their own!

When mountain man Nathaniel King promises a dying Ute warrior that he would find the man's son, he has no idea that he will soon confront an enemy unlike any he has ever faced. For his trail will lead him and his family straight into the clutches of a mysterious, hidden tribe--a tribe that no white man has ever seen and lived to describe.