Second Chances
Living in Place
It’s not often we get second chances, let alone a third, but that’s exactly what Percy Mendell and Rose Mayer, the main characters in Into the Wilderness have, and the way they navigate this gift is filled with charm.
Second edition, second chance for Into the Wilderness
In 1964, in the small town of Orton, Vermont, both characters are at inflection points in their lives. Percy is facing retirement after a long and satisfying career as the county extension agent, helping farmers adapt to new methods for efficiency and yield. It’s a job that’s allowed him to spend his working days in the company of farming men and women, a witness to family life he never had on account of Lila’s death while he was still up in Burlington, at the university. The job brought him workday invitations to join farming families for their mid-day dinner; opportunities to roll up his sleeves and be useful when an extra hand was needed; an occupation that provided enough company during the day that he hasn’t felt lonely in the solitude of home. But the thought of not making the rounds, no longer checking in on the herds and pastures, learning of births and deaths, graduations and grandkids, missing the connection he didn’t even realize had been sustaining him, gives him pause. He’s about to turn sixty-five. What was he going to do with the rest of his life?
Rose Mayer has just buried her second husband. At sixty-four, there are two things about which she is clear: she’s never going to marry again, and she’ll never visit Vermont, let alone live there. She’d emigrated from Galicia as a young girl and left school after eighth grade to help support her family with needle and thread. She married, raised a son, and had neighbors who looked out for one another. But Sam came home from work one day, not feeling so good. Three weeks later, he died. With Dory, it was a slow diminishment. First a cane, then a walker. When it came to a wheelchair, they moved from Brooklyn to Miami, where old people go to die. Rose didn’t want to live there. Her son wanted her to spend the summer at his vacation house in Vermont, then come live with them in New Jersey, like a live-in housekeeper. She didn’t drive, it was all young families, what was she going to do in Jersey? Where was she going to live?
The politics behind the story.
Into the Wilderness is their story, set against the seismic shift that occurred in Vermont politics in 1964 when, for the first time in over a century, Vermonters cast their ballots for the Democratic presidential nominee a year before the Republican state changed its voting laws from one town-one vote. Until 1965 in Vermont, a town with a population of 63 and a city with a population of 30,000 each had a single vote in the state legislature before adopting a more equitable system of proportional representation. Since then, Vermont has steadily tilted left.
My second chance.
Second chances aren’t just for fictional characters. Into the Wilderness is also having a second chance. Originally published in 2010, at the dawn of the independent publishing movement, this “fiercely intelligent love story” sold well, won the Independent Publishers Gold Medal for Regional Fiction, and accolades from the Vermont Library Association for its “sense of place,” and went out of print. Fifteen years later, Sibylline Press is publishing a second edition. A second edition is a book’s second chance—and also mine.
The new edition of Into the Wilderness launches on the heels of Reviving Artemis, The Making of a Huntress, my memoir about finding my way through the untracked forest. After nearly forty years of standing on the sidelines of book publication, I’m now the author of two. One friend called these my “encore years,” and indeed, I’m living a larger life than I imagined possible.
Instead of delivering programs for a statewide organization, I’m now an Artemis Ambassador for the National Wildlife Federation, advocating for land conservation, encouraging women to get outdoors, and building a community in the spirit of Artemis, the goddess of wild nature, women, childbirth, and hunting. In News from the Word Shop (below), you can find where I’ll be speaking and facilitating book discussions and writing circles.
Meeting readers!
Finally, the best thing about these encore years is hearing from and meeting readers. I’m gob-smacked by and profoundly grateful for the reviews readers have posted on Amazon and Goodreads. Getting the word out with a negligible marketing budget depends on readers telling their friends and spreading the word.
Thank you.
News From the Word Shop.
A review of Reviving Artemis by Meghan McCarthy McPaul appears in the Spring 2026 issue of Northern Woodlands Magazine.
April 10, 5:30: RELAUNCH of INTO THE WILDERNESS! ByWay Books & More, 399 Canal Street, Brattleboro, VT 05301. Parking on Lexington.
April 23, 6 pm: “Cousins in Conservation” with Naturalist & Writer Susie Spikol. Keene Public Library, Keene, NH. Free. Online registration required.
April 30: Facilitated discussion of Reviving Artemis for book group. (Private.)
April 30, 5:30 pm: Author-led book discussion of Reviving Artemis. Latham Public Library, Thetford, VT. Books available for purchase & signing.
May 7, 1 pm. Author talk: “Second Chances in Fiction and Life.” Sage Session at Tusten Social, Narrowsburg, NY. Reviving Artemis & Into the Wilderness. Books available for purchase & signing.
May 8, 5-9 pm: Nature-based Memoir Writing Circle. Narrowsburg, NY. More details coming soon!
May 9, 2 pm: Reviving Artemis author talk & book signing at One Grand Books, Narrowsburg, NY
Invite me to speak to your book, conservation organization, senior center or women’s group! In person or by Zoom, we can make it happen. Just Contact me.
This looks wonderful!