Novelist L. C. Maxie creates a real world interwoven with myth and magic in this intimate portrait of a middle-aged woman who moves from tragedy to revelation and, ultimately, resurgence.

Harper Wood is recently widowed, and although she mourns her husband’s loss, she also acknowledges, with characteristic rationality, that he was uncaring and unfaithful. The couple, along with their daughter, now in college, had lived in a spacious house in Raleigh, North Carolina, that never suited Harper, who now longs for something small and homey. When a former workmate invites her to Thanksgiving in the small mountain town of Whippoorwill Gap, Harper feels destined to stay.

Fortuitously, while there, she sees a time-worn used bookshop for sale called The Robin’s Nest. Harper is soon its owner, with big plans for rearranging the piles of dusty books and converting an upper floor to a cozy dwelling. She finds many compatible companions among the townspeople. Meanwhile, she also hears odd sounds, notices flocks of robins, and sees that the shop seems to clean itself, books neatly stacked by a nocturnal invisible presence in her new home.

A small, clouded mirror she was given in remembrance of her grandmother keeps getting clearer and brighter. Soon, she meets a mysterious being and other faeries wearing red vests and is linked with her grandmother’s spirit, then taken to a fantastic, ancient realm she was preordained to explore.

Maxie, a retired librarian, skillfully follows the evolution of her appealing central character: a lonely woman who overcomes her shyness as the story unfolds. This unreal world is crafted with vivid, charming description—at one point a villain is turned into mist “that was rapidly sucked into Harper’s beloved mirror with the efficiency of a retractable vacuum cleaner cord.” The author crafts a believable world, at times comfortably amusing and enchanting.

It’s a page-turner that leaves readers anticipating what will happen next as Harper and her human and faerie friends discover the possibilities lurking in the magical village of Whippoorwill Gap.

Also available as an ebook.