Library book: The Beautiful and the Wild by Peggy Townsen

Publisher: Berkley

Published: 11/7/2023

Pages: 281

Genre: Thriller, Mystery

Review: Library book

Amazon

The dangers of Alaska aren't limited to storms, starvation, and grizzly bears. Sometimes the most dangerous thing is the person you love.It’s summer in Alaska and the light surrounding the shipping-container-turned-storage shed where Liv Russo is being held prisoner is fuzzy and gray. Around her is thick forest and jagged mountains. In front of her, across a clearing, is a low-slung cabin with a single window that spills a wash of yellow light onto bare ground. Illuminated in that light is the father of her child, a man she once loved. A man who is now her jailor. Liv vows to do anything to escape.  Carrying her own secrets and a fierce need to protect her young son, Liv must navigate a new world where extreme weather, starvation, and dangerous wildlife are not the only threats she faces. With winter's arrival imminent, she knows she must reckon with her past and the choices that brought her to the unforgiving Alaskan landscape if she is ever going to make it out alive.A story of survival in the wilds of Alaska, The Beautiful and the Wild explores the question of whether we can ever truly know the person we love—or ourselves.

A woman in a storage container just sorta grabs you to read the story. As we dive deeper into the storyline, we see more than meets the eye. We are told parts of the story in California and other parts in Alaska. Liv has a son and, at one point, was happily married until she wasn't. What secret life was her husband living? What secrets does Liv have? How do they intertwine?

When she ends up in Alaska, she gets way more than she bargains for, and if she wants to be able to see her son again, she has to get into the mindset that the others living on the property believe. The book is labeled as survival, but there was only a little survival besides hunting and gathering food. Overall, I enjoyed the story.  

Peggy Townsend is longtime newspaper reporter who has won state and national awards for her work. She has written about teen-agers who lived on the streets, health-care disparities and serial killers ranging from Trailside Killer David Carpenter to Billy Mansfield. Kirkus Reviews named her first book, "See Her Run," as "One of 13 Thrillers to Keep You Up at Night." Her new thriller "The Beautiful and the Wild" will be released Nov. 7, 2023. She's run rivers, come face-to-face with grizzly bears and twice lived in her van for seven weeks at a time. She lives on the beach in Central California and at her small cabin in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.