Woodsburner

An “intelligent and often lyrical first novel . . .” New York Times Book Review (5/1/09)

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 sample of the novel, click the link below:
Woodsburner - Chapter 1 excerpt.doc

“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

“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

John Pipkin