An “intelligent and often lyrical first novel . . .” New York Times Book Review (5/1/09) http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/03/books/review/Wineapple-t.htmlshapeimage_1_link_0
In the spring of 1844, American naturalist Henry David Thoreau accidentally set fire to 300 acres of woods near Walden Pond in Massachusetts. The consequences of this fire, told through the lives of four main characters, form the narrative heart of the novel. Woodsburner interweaves the story of Thoreau, a young pencil maker by trade; Oddmund Hus, a Norwegian immigrant and farmhand who pines for the love of a woman he cannot have; bookseller Eliot Calvert, an aspiring but unsuccessful playwright who must choose between his business and his art; and Caleb Dowdy, an opium-addicted Episcopal minister who believes he can prove God’s existence by seeking his own damnation. All four men are leading lives of quiet desperation when their encounter with Thoreau’s fire alters them forever. Combining fiction and history, Woodsburner chronicles these changed lives against the background of a final compelling character; the fire itself, which gains a powerful personality as it progresses toward the town and eats away at the Concord landscape. To download a text sample of the novel, click the link below: Woodsburner - Chapter 1 excerpt.doc To listen to a sample of the audiobook, as read by Henry Strozier, click on Audible.com. Woodsburner_files/Woodsburner%20-%20Chapter%201%20excerpt.dochttp://www.audible.com.cn/adbl/site/products/ProductDetail.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@0377653607.1256010870@@@@&BV_EngineID=cccfadeiimekhficefecekjdffidflj.0&redirectFlag=&productID=BK_RECO_003445shapeimage_2_link_0shapeimage_2_link_1
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“Witty, bawdy, philosophical, touching, and humorous, Woodsburner is a novel I didn’t want to end . . .   This book is packed with interesting ideas, vital characters, and vivid writing.”
--Sena Jeter Naslund, author of Ahab’s Wife and Four Spirits
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“Woodsburner is a tour de force.  A kaleidoscopic dissection of the American character told as a fugitive fire ignites and illuminates the lives of characters, each more compelling than the last.  A masterful work by a writer of singular power, insight and lyricism.”
 
--Sarah Bird, author of How Perfect is That, The Flamenco Academy, The Boyfriend School, and The Yokota Officers Club
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John Pipkin
 
        Now available in paperback!