Winner of the 1997 Mythopoeic Award for Best Novel

Leaving behind her fashionable West Coast life, Maggie Black comes to the Southwestern desert to pursue her passion and her dream. Her mentor, the acclaimed poet Davis Cooper, has mysteriously died in the canyons east of Tucson, bequeathing her his estate and the mystery of his life — and death.

Maggie is astonish by the power of this harsh but beautiful land and captivated by the uncommon people who call it home — especially Fox, a man unlike any she has ever known, who understands the desert's special power.

As she reads Cooper's letters and learns the secrets of his life, Maggie comes face-to-face withe the wild, ancient spirits of the desert — and discovers the hidden power at its heart, a power that will take her on a journey like no other.

"A wonderful, elegant fantasy — sensuous, fascinating, and eerily spiritual." Robert Holdstock

"This is a novel of muscle and tenderness, of sharp edges and great delights." Charles de Lint

"Luminous...Interweaves the reality of a woman finding her voice and her path, with fantastic embodiments of nature." Locus

"Winner of five World Fantasy Awards for her editing, Windling (coeditor with Ellen Datlow of the annual Year's Best Fantasy & Horror anthologies) now shows off her writing skills with this strong first novel, a fantasy. When writer Maggie Black learns that her friend and mentor, poet Davis Cooper, has died and left her his house in the arid hills outside Tucson, Ariz., she travels there intending to write his biography and to investigate the mysterious circumstances of his death. Every detail she uncovers about Cooper's past, however, only seems to raise more questions. When Maggie comes home one evening to find that the house has been ransacked, it becomes clear that she's not the only one looking for answers. To solve the puzzle of Cooper's life and death, Maggie will have to outwit the Trickster and the other powerful quasi-human creatures that roam the desert hills and feed on creative energy. Although at times Windling's humans come off as too sensitive and artistic, her Native American spirits comprise an intriguing blend of human folklore and alien emotion. Her debut novel is richly imaginative, a captivating mix of traditional fantasy and magical realism." Publishers Weekly Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

"A splendid desert enchantment that flows with its own eerie logic — arresting, evocative, and well worked out..." Kirkus Reviews

An award-winning tale of passion, danger, and wild desert magic.

When prize-winning poet Davis Cooper died mysteriously in the canyons east of Tucson, Arizona, he left his estate to Maggie Black, a young writer who knew him only from his letters. There, in his desert home, Maggie begins a journey of self-discovery that changes her forever, encountering terrible danger and passionate love, coming face to face with the wild spirits that inhabit that strange and magical place. The winner of the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award on its first publication, this enchanting masterwork by a five-time winner of the World Fantasy Award now returns to print alongside the classic urban fantasies of Charles de Lint and Emma Bull.