The Wild Between Us: A Novel

The Wild Between Us is the first novel by American author, Amy Hagstrom. When Aunt Mary's gift of the Marble Lake Lodge coincides with his ex, Miranda's departure for a dream job in Manchester, Silas Matheson quits his job protecting vulnerable Oregon wilderness and takes his two young sons with him to run the lodge.

But returning to Feather Creek after fleeing fifteen years earlier isn't easy; he'll have to face Meg and Danny, the friends he left behind after Jessica Howard went missing in the Marble Lake Wilderness back in 2003, and he's not expecting a warm welcome.

Two weeks on, he's just discovering how run down the place is when almost-eight-year-old Spencer and five-year-old Cameron, bored with waiting on the promised hike, set out alone in the late afternoon to climb the ridge, and fail to return. Mid-November is not a good time for two boys without warm clothing, food or drink, to be lost in the Sierra Nevada.

Meg Tanner and Danny Cairns get an early-hours call as part of the Feather River Search and Rescue team, coming face to face with Silas, and the unsettling memory of eighteen-year-old Jessica missing in the same place.

They're searching right where Jessica went missing, but this time, looking for two young boys. Silas, Meg and Danny have each told lies and kept secrets for fifteen years: what might be exposed during the search? And can they put aside differences to find the boys?

Except for Spencer's prologue, Silas and Meg alternately carry the story, although their lies make them unreliable narrators, and the dual timeline narrative very gradually reveals just what happened on the day four teens went into the Wilderness and only three returned. It becomes clear that Silas, now dedicated to the protection of the wilderness, was charismatic, impulsive and rather selfish, and that each of the teens made some poor choices.

There's a lot of detail about the Search and Rescue process, no doubt drawn from the author's experience, and Hagstrom's descriptions of the setting are very evocative. An impressive debut.

This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing