A frustrated artist with a traumatic past finds mystery and healing on a remote Maine island in this ârichly told and hauntingly beautifulâ novel  (Heather Gudenkauf, New York Times bestselling author).
Years ago on a spring afternoon, thirteen-year-old Wyn Davies took a shortcut through the woods in her New Hampshire hometown and became a cautionary tale. Now, twenty years later, she lives in New York, on the opposite side of a duplex from her ex, with their four-year-old daughter shuttling between them. Wyn makes her living painting commissioned canvases of birch trees to match her clientsâ furnishings. But the nagging sense that she has sold her artistic soul is soon eclipsed by a greater fear. Robby Rousseau, who has spent the past two decades in prison for a terrible crime against her, may be released based on new DNA evidenceâunless Wyn breaks her silence about that afternoon.
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To clear her head, Wyn agrees to be temporary caretaker for a friendâs new property on an island off the coast of Maine. The house has been empty for years, and in the basement Wyn discovers a box of film canisters labeled âEpitaphs and Prophecies.â Like time capsules, the photographs help her piece together the life of the houseâs former owner, an artistic young mother. But there is a mystery behind the images too, and unraveling it will force Wyn to finally confront what happened in those woodsâand perhaps escape them at last.âAn emotionally charged novel with many layers, rounded out by a cast of memorable characters.ââPublishers Weekly