I requested this ARC through @netgalley and appreciate the opportunity I had to read it, but being as busy as we have been lately I was excited to receive an ALC from @librofm 🎧 Thank you greatly to both!

Being as it had been a minute, I had ultimately forgotten what this book was about. I went in blind, but I knew it was worth trying because I do NOT request ARC’s that do not interest me. I must say, I was NOT disappointed.

When a hiker, Valerie, of the #appalachiantrail doesn’t show up for her scheduled rendezvous with her supporter a search begins to try to find her. Along the way we get to know other characters on a deeper level, such as the game warden leading the search for Valerie and an elderly woman who becomes aware of Valerie’s disappearance through an online friendship. All are eager to find Valerie, whether it is in order to rescue her, or to bring her family closure.

All in all this is a story about love, but its core focus is on a mother’s relationship with her daughter(s), even that of Mother Earth. Nature is a sort of character of its own in this novel, which I am always there for! This book brought me to tears more than once, which used to be a rarity, but it is happening more and more as I grow older 🙃

Overall, I enjoyed this book and its full-cast narration. Spoiler: My biggest dissatisfaction was the ultimate “bad guy” being COVID, but I understand how its presence was important to character development. COVID playing such a prominent role in a novel just still feels too soon. Not because I don’t agree that it severely affected our society, but because I still get stink face if I happen to sneeze or cough in public places. You know those looks. Those looks that say without words “why are you here if you’re sick?! You’re going to infect us all!” Calm down sis, it was just your perfume, or my brain forgetting not to inhale my own saliva!

As you may recall, I tend to shy away from hyped new releases, or books that are a part of a celebrity book club, but this one was worthy.

Happy reading. Stay gold.

This book was enthralling, poetic, and simultaneously claustrophobic and expansive. It follows three different women who are all tied together because one of them, Valerie, has gone missing. Valerie was hiking the Appalachian Trail, but somehow got lost. Beverly is the Maine State Game Warden in charge of the search for Valerie, and Lena is an online participant in the search.
All three of the women are dealing with loneliness in different capacities. Valerie had spent most of her trek with a hiking partner, but is now lost in the woods, utterly alone. Bev devoted her life to her job, and has no partner or children to turn to. And Lena has been shunned by her daughter and lives in a self-imposed isolation in her retirement community, communicating almost exclusively online.
The exploration of each character’s loneliness and search for connection was heartbreaking and hopeful. Gaige’s writing was beautiful and added an extra layer of solemn complexity to an already tense storyline. I’d highly recommend this to anyone looking for a slower-paced but still intense mystery!

I really liked this book - I found it incredibly moving and descriptive. I loved each of the characters and their POVs' especially the armchair detective Lena in the assisted living facility. I loved the descriptions of hiking the Appalachian Trail and ultimately, the happy ending for everyone!

HEARTWOOD is a captivating, thrilling, and well-executed literary thriller.

This is the story of Valerie, a woman hiking the Appalachian trail who becomes lost in Maine in the final days of her journey. It is told from multiple POVs, including a fellow hiker, Val herself, and Beverly, the woman in charge of leading the investigation into Val’s disappearance.

HEARTWOOD checked all the literary mystery boxes for me:
a compelling, propulsive mystery ✔️
beautiful writing ✔️
well developed characters ✔️
a story connected to broader, relevant themes ✔️

Because of this, I absolutely devoured the story, reading it between involuntarily snoozes on the couch the weekend of Daylight savings (swipe to see my snuggle buddy). It is one of the most propulsive novels I’ve read in recent memory, satisfying my cravings for a thriller, but with a pleasant and grounding depth.

Though there is a lot more I could say, but this is one that is best consumed with few expectations. My advice would be to simply buckle up and enjoy the ride. Better yet, convince a few friends to read it alongside you — I loved dissecting this one with @katyisreading and @thesouthphillyreader.

P.S. If you are a fellow super fan of GOD OF THE WOODS, don’t sleep on this one! Thanks to @simonbooks for my e-ARC of this one 🩵

Heartwood by Amity Gaige is a story of survival and bravery. Valeria, trail name Sparrow goes missing on the Appalachian Trail. I know someone who hiked the trail so I was intrigued when I read the book description.

I enjoyed the setting of the book. I felt that the characters were just random people who didn’t really fit in the story and had no connection to each other. All in all I found the book to be mediocre. The ending was anticlimactic. When I finished the book my thoughts were wow did I really spend all that time reading this book….for what? I thought the book had potential but everything went downhill as the book progressed.

I do believe there is an audience for this book. It got an average rating of 4.1 stars. If the description of the book sounds interesting I suggest giving it a try. It was published April 1, 2025.

Thank you NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Heartwood is a tightly wound literary thriller that pulls you in from the very first page. Centered on the mysterious disappearance of a woman hiking the Appalachian Trail, the novel balances suspense with a deeply emotional undercurrent. Amity Gaige masterfully weaves in a tender, moving exploration of mother/daughter dynamics—both the bonds that nurture and the tensions that pull us apart.

While the plot moves with the urgency of a page-turner, what truly elevates the book is its emotional resonance. Gaige’s prose is thoughtful and elegant, and she never loses sight of the humanity behind the mystery. If you're looking for a thriller with depth and heart, Heartwood is well worth the hike.

Five Star read for me! I loved the characters and how they all tied together at the end. The storyline was compulsive and yet also quiet. I couldn't put it down and highly recommend Heartwood.

Perfect for fans of Kimi Cunningham Grant's stories, I found a lot of wonderful similar themes in terms of nature and survival and excellent blend of character development and mystery.

Thank you S&S and Simon Books for review copies of Heartwood, I loved this story and really recommend it on audio, the multi actor performance and production made this a great audio.

Heartwood is much more than the plot summary sounds... it's a rich story of survival, a fascinating story of the detective and her investigation, a great story of nature and resilience found in nature, and an ode to memory and love and relationships. Gaige crafts a surprsingly intimate mystery, one filled with suspense but also well developed characters and a tension that builds into a satisfying resolution.

A hiker goes missing on the Appalachian Trail in Maine. She's close to her goal but fails to meet her husband at one of their planned check points. A massive search and rescue effort is mobilized to find her. 

This is the premise of Heartwood by Amity Gaige. Told from multiple perspectives, the mystery unfolds. Hiker Valerie, trail name Sparrow, narrates her story in journals written to her mother.  In charge of the search and rescue team, we have first-person narration from Lieutenant Bev Miller. Rounding out the trio is birdwatcher and citizen detective Lena, wheelchair bound and living in a retirement community.

There were recurring themes across the women's stories. Mother-daughter relationships, respect for nature, strength and perseverance, stubbornness. Lots of drama. At times the voices were so distant from each other that I felt I was reading three different books. 

After a slow burn (and several red herrings), Heartwood did pick up, and those narratives did come together. I just wish its pages had turned a little more quickly. 

My thanks to NetGalley and Simon and Schuster for the Advance Reader Copy. (pub date 4/1/2025)

I finally read my ARC after hearing so many great reviews for this one. I was initially intrigued by the synopsis. As I began reading, I found myself emerged in each character. Told in multiple POVs and media intertwined, I became very invested in what happened to this missing hiker. As the story was unfolding, I began to wonder if this was a slow burn thriller. At about 65%, I realized, it was in fact not a thriller but more of a suspenseful, literary fiction novel. It didn’t change much perspective as I already engaged.

The ending really redeemed this book for me. In it I found that redemption comes in all forms. And forgiveness. Forgiveness of others as well as ourselves. Lena was probably the most unique character. I found her self reflection to be so humane and realistic. As an older woman, she was able to look back on her life and realize her mistakes. But she was able to connect with family again and gain a new perspective…even if it is temporary. Bev grew on me. I felt connected to her even though she’s much older, but I too was career driven and family focused when my mother became sick. I understand her struggles of trying to be there for those important to you all the while being present in a career you truly love. Finally, Valerie was so genuine and full of life. Even when things were uncertain, she held tight. I loved reading her journal entries the most even though sometimes I felt lost because they were is lyrical and poetic.

Overall, a great story and I’m truly grateful I gave it a shot. I look forward to reading more literary fiction even if I don’t always understand the themes presented in them.

Somewhere in Maine, deep in the woods near the Appalachian Trail, Valerie Gillis goes missing. She is 42 and an experienced hiker that was traveling the last 200 miles of her journey solo. Her husband patiently waited at their designated location for supplies and Valerie never showed up. The State Game Warden is notified and within hours a full fledge search and rescue is underway. Every hour of every day changes the possibility of finding Valerie alive. Beverly is the head warden and as a female she has always had to be tougher and better than the rest. But she also has a big heart and this search becomes personal. Bev deeply feels for the grieving parents and the many teams that she has put together who have been working around the clock. As the days unfold she struggles to keep faith that they will be successful, it seems as if Valerie has vanished. Lena, an aging forager (person who collects edible plants) has spent her life as a scientist and is painfully bored in her retirement home. Lena begins to put the pieces together as she follows the story of the missing hiker. Although Lena essentially keeps to herself she has a way of understanding nature and people better than most. Slow burn mystery filled with the beauty of the AT, the people who hike it and those who protect it.

An experienced hiker, Valerie, has mysteriously disappeared on an Appalachian Trail in Maine. A highly trained game warden, Beverly, has taken on her case and won’t stop until she’s found. Most hikers are found within a 2-3 day time frame, but Valerie must be deep in the wilderness because it’s taking longer than expected. The chances of survival dwindle down with each passing day. Will they find her in time?

This book read like a true crime novel which I loved! We had Beverly that exhausted her efforts in finding Valerie, the interviews with those that hiked along side her, news clippings that gave updates on the search, and Valerie’s diary entries that kept us hopeful for her survival.

This would’ve been a five star read for me, but Lena bumped my rating down. I know she had one significant part in the story, but did we have to spend so much time on her character because I sped past her chapters.

Overall, this wilderness suspense novel was impossible to put down and I can’t wait to read the author’s next book!

HEARTWOOD is a straight forward mystery: a search for a missing hiker. The intriguing part of the book is it offers three viewpoints of the search; three different women become fully engaged in this plot. And all three women experience a sort of mourning as the book progresses. The hiker is a nurse trying to recover from the hell of the Pandemic, and the many losses she confronted. The head of the search is a woman with a near perfect record of finding lost hikers, who realizes she has other issues to attend to, unrelated to her job. And finally, an elderly woman in a nursing home wonders if the lost hiker is her estranged daughter. This is a very slow moving book that challenges readers more comfortable with a quicker pace. I received my copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

I enjoyed Heartwood by Amity Gage. I don't consider it a thriller as it may have been described in some places. More of a literary fiction with a bit of a mystery. The story focuses on Valerie, a person everyone seems to love, who disappears while hiking the Appalachian Trail. It takes place after the Covid pandemic, but isn't the focus of the story. It's a moment in time that the reader can connect with and commiserate with the FMC to better understand her feelings and struggles.

The story has multiple POV from the different characters who know her or are involved in searching for her. There are parts of the story with journal entries from Valerie telling her POV and showing her mindset during the ordeal leading the reader to become more invested and curious as to her outcome. Why did Valerie take on this enormous painstaking goal of hiking 2,000 miles? This was my first book by Amity Gage and I enjoyed it and the stories of the secondary characters as well! There was a lot of reflection from the various characters regarding their life and choices made.

The Appalachian Mountains are ancient — as John Denver sang, older than the trees. Back when the only landform was Pangea, the Appalachians were part of what is now Scotland. It’s no wonder European settlers found their way here, this land is ancestral, they knew it in their bones and it called them home. I think that’s so haunting and beautiful.

HEARTWOOD was a book I wanted to read the moment I first heard of it. On its surface, it’s about a search for a missing hiker on the Appalachian Trail. Just 200 miles from the end in Maine, Valerie vanished. Her hiking partner had to quit due to a family emergency and she never checked in with her husband at a meeting point. Even an experienced hiker could run into trouble alone in the woods: did she injure herself? Is she lost?

Lieutenant Beverly, the Maine State Game Warden, is heading the search, well aware time is crucial. Best case scenario: Valerie got turned around and she’ll find her way back to the trail and a shelter. As the hours turn into days — and the relentless rain washes away any scent or shoe prints — the best case scenario is looking less likely and optimism is running thin.

Lena is an elderly woman in an assisted living community in Connecticut. She spends her days chatting with a foraging group on Reddit, one member she’s especially close to. It’s through his posts and chats she comes to learn about the missing hiker and finds herself invested in the case.

While HEARTWOOD sounds like a thriller, it’s very much a mother/daughter story. Bev’s mother is dying and she’s not sure if she should go home; Lena’s estranged daughter rejects any attempt at communication; alone in the woods, Valerie writes letters to her mother.

I loved this. Like THE GOD OF THE WOODS, it’s a slow burn, quiet story. Much more of a literary mystery than edge-of-your-seat thriller. This was a book I carried around with me throughout the house, cooking with one hand while reading with the other. I thought about it when I wasn’t reading and counted down the hours until I could pick it up again. This is my introduction to Gaige’s work — but it won’t be my last!

I enjoyed this a lot. I was very engaged from page one. with our missing female hitchhiker on the Appalachian Trail. I felt the hopelessness as the search went on day after helpless day. It was an interesting twist with the senior woman who was chatting online with the individual that might prove a connection to our missing hiker.

Thank you @simonbooks #SimonBooksBuddy for the gifted e-arc and @simon.audio for the audiobook.

This addictive, slow-burn missing person mystery was filled with beautiful prose and poignant storytelling. I loved the multi-POV, and I highly recommend the audiobook for full cast narration.

Amity Gaige packs this suspense-filled story with heartfelt introspection. This is a story that will stick with me.

Read if you enjoy:
🥾 hiking, nature
🏕️ women’s fiction
🥾 stories of self-discovery and resilience
🏕️ multi-pov and full cast narration
🥾 suspenseful, gripping writing
🏕️ mixed media storytelling and short chapters

My rating: 4.5⭐️

I have read two of Amity Gaige's previous books, Schroeder and Sea Wife, and just finished this, her latest. Each has had me fully invested in the characters and very curious to see where the story will take us. What's particularly impressive is how very different from each other the plots are. I think this is her best, and I loved the three female points of view. Ultimately, this is the story of mothers and daughters, against the backdrop of the search for a missing AT hiker:

Cleverly constructed and engrossing tale about a woman who goes missing while hiking the Appalachian Trail. It’s more complicated than a simple search and rescue saga, with memorable characters and a whole lot of heart. I love Amity Gaige and she does not disappoint here. I absolutely could not put it down!

A sincere thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for an ARC of this novel.

This is a very mixed review. I absolutely loved all three of our main characters, and I really enjoyed the juxtaposition of their POVs interspersed with emails and conversations. It helped keep the pace steady and moving forward. The Maine wilderness was also a main character in a way (pun semi-intended).

But there were parts of this that were so largely irrelevant that it pulled me out of the story. Lena’s presence in this book is largely unnecessary - we don’t spend as much time with her as we do Bev & Valerie but we spent a good amount of time with her. It felt almost like padding an essay to reach a word count. The writing was spectacular of course - but some of the irrelevant details could’ve been tied in more.

Thank you to NetGalley, Amity Gage, and Simon & Schuester for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.