The Cabin on Souder Hill

Quotes

“A wild ride of suspense and mystique that is thought-provoking and compelling.” Lisa Renee Jones, New York Times bestselling author of The Poet

“Busch keeps the mysterious atmosphere thick enough to cut with a knife.” Kirkus Reviews

“Part mystery, part marriage story, and full-on thriller, Lonnie Busch’s novel, The Cabin on Souder Hill, follows Michelle Stage on a riveting adventure to solve a seeming schism between two realities based around the cabin she and her husband bought in the western North Carolina mountains to escape the city, a tragic death, and their failing marriage. A conflicting memory between Michelle and her husband begins her search for her truth. Busch weaves his tale with indelible characters, well-wrought prose, both durable and lyrical at turns, and brings the eye of a literary writer to provide a multilayered and exhilarating read. Besides creating a highly engaging narrative, Busch captures the details and inner workings of his southern setting perfectly. The Cabin on Souder Hill is a remarkable debut novel the reader will not forget, relishing in its story as well as its telling by a true wordsmith.” Jubal Tiner, author of The Waterhouse

“Award-winning author Lonnie Busch has honed his craft over the years, creating memorable characters in unpredictable circumstances. Now he’s at the top of his game with The Cabin on Souder Hill, a skillfully plotted thriller with more twists and turns than a mountain road with perilous switchbacks. A haunting story I couldn’t put down.” Susan Snowden, author of Southern Fried Lies and A Closet Full of Masks

“Michelle’s journey through a landscape of fading memories and false realities is made all the more arduous by the eerie and atmospheric world that surrounds her. It all seems correct—but how can it be? Busch’s characters are layered and complex, veering from tragic to comic and back again. Absorbing and compulsively readable, The Cabin on Souder Hill illustrates the power of the mind to overcome the dichotomy of what is rational and what is true.” William Kowalski, author of Eddie’s Bastard and The Best Polish Restaurant in Buffalo

“Like an episode of The Twilight Zone set in the Appalachians, Lonnie Busch delivers an exciting, surreal, and mind-bending mystery. Michelle Stage’s tumble down the mountain and into a different reality is a haunting trip that I couldn’t put down. The perfect summer read.” Ace Atkins, New York Times bestselling author of Robert B. Parker’s Angel Eyes and The Revelators

“Lonnie Busch masterfully captures both the ordinary and the extraordinary in unsentimental, commanding prose in the chilling and atmospheric Cabin on Souder Hill. When the husband of the main character, Michelle Stage, disappears in the Appalachian woods searching for the source of a strange light below their cabin, she soon follows, tumbling into an alternate reality. From then on, just like Michelle, I was caught and couldn’t put it down. Busch’s instinctive understanding of love and loss makes the surreal seem real. He never skips a suspenseful beat as he explores the painful trails love and loss make in our world with clear-eyed affection and wit. All his characters, unique and fully realized, take you to surprising places and some will make you laugh – even as you begin to question reality.” Christine Carbo, bestselling author of the award-winning Glacier Mystery Series

“It is an interesting and occasionally thought-provoking read. It asks the question, ‘Are our fates set in stone?’ The book doesn’t precisely answer it, but leaves readers to mull it over themselves.” Mystery Scene

“Busch has created a character the reader will be touched by and won’t soon forget, and when [Pink Souder] is remembered, it’s with a pang of empathetic regret.” New York Journal of Books

Awards

• io9 Pick