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Winner of
Best Fiction Award
from Adirondack Center
for Writing

Within a Forest Dark
An Adirondack Tale of Love and Suspicion

A Novel by Michael Virtanen

$11.95, softcover, 128 pages
Published in 2007

When Jack Kirkland travels to the Adirondack Mountains to investigate the death of a well-to-do engineer, he expects to uncover medical malpractice. Instead, he finds evidence of murder and falls in love with the only suspect, the dead man's girlfriend. Will Kirkland give up his shot at happiness to get at the truth?

REVIEWS

Within a Forest Dark is a riveting tale of high order, the first of what promises to be other novels by an experienced journalist."

--BERNARD F. CONNERS,
Co-founder of British American Publishing, author of Dancehall

"An engaged, complicated, compelling journey into the motivations of middle age.Virtanen has written a cross-genre mystery that rejects the usual question of who, replacing it with a much deeper why."

--PAM HOUSTON,
Author of Cowboys Are My Weakness , Waltzing the Cat and Sight Hound

"The story gathers momentum like a freight train."

--FRED LEBRUN, Columnist for the Albany Times Union

" Within a Forest Dark is a terrific book. Deftly plotted and fast paced, it is written in a style--call it Virtanenese--that is a wonderful blend of economy and grace. But what puts this novel on my short list of highly re-readable mysteries are Virtanen's characters. He renders them with an awful honesty, yet great compassion. They are very much products of their place, a corridor that runs from Albany to Lake Placid--but not, as we learn early on, the corridor created by the high-speed, tourist-friendly Northway, or Interstate 87. No, these are the people of the old, slow two-lanes, a world most notable for its strip malls, rundown motels, fast-food joints, junkyards. And the very best of the characters is Jack Kirkland, an insurance investigator who is the protagonist and narrator. An ex-boxer, Jack has suffered a lot of losses by the time we meet him and will suffer more as the novel unfolds, not least because he has a willful tendency to lead with his face . . . or, in some instances, his heart."

--Prof. STEPHEN NORTH, Teacher of Mystery and Detective Fiction at the University at Albany

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

MICHAEL VIRTANEN is a graduate of Colgate University and the University at Albany, where he earned a master's degree in English. He is a veteran journalist whose articles on the Adirondacks and other topics have appeared in newspapers across the country as well as in the magazines Adirondack Life and Adirondack Explorer. On one assignment, he suffered frostbite on his toes while skiing through the High Peaks Wilderness, but he still relishes adventure in the Adirondacks. He enjoys hiking, paddling, and rock climbing. Michael lives with his wife, Saundra, and their ever-watchful dog, Daisy, in upstate New York.

ABOUT THE COVER

The cover was designed by Susan Bibeau of Saranac Lake. The cover photo was taken by Carl Heilman II, one of the Adirondacks' most acclaimed photographers, from the top of Cat Mountain near Lake George during the 2007 Perseid meteor shower.