eBooks - Young Adults - Fiction - William H. Reid - North of Nowhere
North of Nowhere eBook
by William H. Reid
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North of Nowhere Summary
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This wilderness adventure of overcoming starts in the wild lands north of the Brooks Range in Alaska. Darren and
Carrie escape from a corrective wilderness trip, only to face far greater challenges. At the start the kids are searched by
the trip leader: Darren Freeman raged at the man holding his marijuana cigarettes. “Nazi!” The man’s flat-handed slap was sharp, stinging. “Welcome to Alaska, Mister Druggie, where real men know what’s right! Your tail is grass, boy, and I’m the lawn mower.” The pressure grows as they float down the Coville River on rafts. Each day is worse than the first day of basic training. After being beaten Darren decides to flee. He is joined, at first against his will, by Carrie after trip leader Cornwall tells her to sleep in his tent. Pushing hard over the tundra and turning into the mountains, they manage to elude Cornwall’s pursuit after stealing his pistol, but, after crossing the high ridges to the south, they are trapped by winter’s first, hard storms. Without adequate food or enough warm clothing, they build a pit house, something Darren learned reading National Geographics while in detention. They kill a moose. While butchering it, a grizzly bear rushes Darren, who empties his pistol it. The bear injures Darren as Carrie runs her spear into it: Darren staggered backward in the clinging bog plants that made it impossible to turn and run, knowing he had maybe two seconds for action. He stopped and crouched and brought the pistol up. It happened impossibly fast but seemed like slow motion. Rapidly, he emptied the pistol of its six heavy slugs without feeling the kick or hearing the reports. He saw shots hit the bear’s chest, but the bear was not counting. Darren’s thought was very clear: I'm going to die. Darren heard a high, screaming, "Get away from him!” The bear splashed to a stop on wide-spread legs, confused. Carrie hit the bear at full speed with the spear held forward like she was pole vaulting. It went deep into it's chest, then broke as Carrie flipped over the animal's back. She landed with a huge splash while the bear spun to bite at the spear. It fell, then rose, coughing a fine mist of blood. Blood poured from its chest, and the broken spear stuck out obscenely. The bear spotted Darren and lunged with a swipe that just caught Darren on the shoulder as he twisted away. The blow threw him backwards, crashing through the thin ice into deep water. The bear came after him. Carrie sews Darren’s wounds, but infection spreads and sends him into delirium. Carrie reopens the wounds, draining the infection, and Darren passes out. When he finally wakens a Native Alaskan family is there. They help Darren and Carrie and teach them to survive the cold. After they leave Darren and Carrie celebrate Christmas, then hone their skills until early spring. The go out, with a series of adventures on the way. They find a recent plane wreck, with the hated Cornwall lying injured. They bundle him in their toboggan, where he wonders at their survival: Cornwall’s hand clutched his arm. “Wait!” Darren bent closer. “I’m right here.” “You’ve been out there this whole time, six, eight months...the both of you?” Darren glanced at Carrie, then back to Cornwall. “Yes.” “How’d you do it?” Darren’s voice was gentle again. “I learned from you.” Cornwall shook his head. “No, there’s more. I’ve been listening. One minute you’re hard and the next you’re, uh, soft. You’ve got something now that I never had.” Carrie put a hand on Cornwall’s chest. “Darren learned to be tough and human at the same time. To love and do what you must is the hardest challenge of them all.” After a great struggle with a new storm, they reach a village. Police, game wardens, and their parents arrive. They confront their difficult parents, and, as they plane is about to leave announce they are going to stay in Alaska a while longer, returning again to the wilderness to find their Native Alaskan friends: Darren put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her close. “You know some things will be harder.” Carrie smiled at him. “And some things will be better.” The mountains were gold in the morning sunlight. About the Author: Bill Reid doesn’t always admit he was a rocket scientist, but he was. He grew up in a family of aircraft builders and studies engineering in college. During that time, his neighbors invited him to serve in the Army after he left school to climb mountains in Colorado. He returned after building runways in Europe, graduated and again left for the West. While working on projects like Apollo, he was lured by nature, high country and wilderness adventures. He returned to school for a Ph.D. in ecology. The then became a professor, taught in Texas and Israel, and worked at the National Laboratory where we once made Plutonium. He then coordinated research in seven national parks in Texas and New Mexico for three years. Now, he lives at the edge of southern Utah’s wild lands and writes. |
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eBooks - Titles - Authors - Young Adults - Fiction - William H. Reid - North of Nowhere