Blood MountainBy James Preller
Carter and Grace are on a hike with their dad and their dog, Sitka. They’ve been on hikes before and are comfortable in the woods. So comfortable, in fact, that they both race ahead of their father. Their dad, meanwhile, is getting slower and slower, having trouble making his way up the mountain. He doesn’t mind letting his energetic kids run ahead.
Carter and Grace know they must stick to the trail, but it’s easy to make a wrong turn if you’re not really following the markers. By the time they realize they are lost, they have no idea how to get back to the trail. Although they believe that their dad will catch up and find them, they don’t know that he’s having his own medical problems.
When the siblings decide to make their way to the mountain summit off-trail, they really get lost, not to mention injured. Eventually, the children separate, but neither knows how to get home.
Luckily their mother reports the missing trio and an astute forest ranger heads out to look for them. But there is someone else in the woods as well – a mountain man, rumoured to live on his own in the bush. There is also a mountain lion on the loose, out of its usual territory. No one knows how these two forest inhabitants will react to a couple of lost children.
If you have ever been lost yourself, or just love a good, suspenseful survival story, Blood Mountain is for you!