Shelterwood by Lisa Wingate

Shelterwood by Lisa Wingate

368 pages

Published June 2024 by Random House Publishing Group 

Source: my copy courtesy of the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review

Publisher's Summary: 

1909. Eleven-year-old Olive Augusta Radley knows that her stepfather doesn’t have good intentions toward the two Choctaw girls boarded in their home as wards. When the older girl disappears, Ollie flees to the woods, taking six-year-old Nessa with her. Together they begin a perilous journey to the remote Winding Stair Mountains, the notorious territory of outlaws, treasure hunters, and desperate men. Along the way, Ollie and Nessa form an unlikely band with others like themselves, struggling to stay one step ahead of those who seek to exploit them . . . or worse.

1990. Law enforcement ranger Valerie Boren-Odell arrives at newly minted Horsethief Trail National Park seeking a quiet place to balance a career and single parenthood. But no sooner has Valerie reported for duty than she’s faced with local controversy over the park’s opening, a teenage hiker gone missing from one of the trails, and the long-hidden burial site of three children unearthed in a cave. Val’s quest for the truth wins an ally among the neighboring Choctaw Tribal Police but soon collides with old secrets and the tragic and deadly history of the land itself.

In this emotional and enveloping novel, Lisa Wingate traces the story of children abandoned by the law and the battle to see justice done. Amid times of deep conflict over who owns the land and its riches, Ollie and Val traverse the rugged and beautiful terrain, each leaving behind one life in search of another.

From Lisa Wingate:

"Shelterwood began with an unexpected spark on an ordinary day, when the research for another novel led to a vintage newspaper mention of “Oklahoma Kate” Barnard, a female elected official (a rarity in a time when women couldn’t even vote) who was compelled to investigate reports of three “elf children” living in a hollow tree and begging for food at nearby farmhouses in 1909. In rescuing the children, Kate would discover that they were not elves at all, but orphans of Oklahoma’s Five Tribes (the Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Seminole). Along with fifty-one other children, they were under the protection of a court-appointed guardian, who had “lost all track of ” most of his wards. He was living lavishly on their oil monies, while the children survived in the woods and became so malnourished, skittish, and small that people thought they were elves."

What Worked For Me: 

• I always enjoy when a book directly ties to a piece of history, especially one that I'm not as familiar with. I love learning about what inspired books, particularly when that inspiration is based on a piece of unknown history. Here Wingate has done a terrific job of taking this small piece of history and crafting a world around these children. 
• Those children. I really grew attached to all of them...even the bad boys. They were all done wrong by the adults in their lives. Their tenacity, resourcefulness, and relationships were believable to inspiring, even if that part was fiction. Equally as believable was the way they couldn't help but be the children they were, destroying what they had built. 
• Valerie, a widowed single mother who is torn between wanting to protect her son and wanting to get to the truth. Wingate doesn't make her invincible, all knowing, or fearless - she makes her relatable and realistic. 
• I liked this look at a woman breaking into a traditionally male career. I always like books that do that. 
• We've got a setting in this book that I was entirely unfamiliar with and I enjoyed learning more about the mountains of Oklahoma (I'll be honest, until a couple of years ago, I was pretty sure that Oklahoma was entirely flat). 

What Didn't Work As Well For Me:

• This is one of those books where we move back and forth in time, reading two storylines and moving to the place where they will intersect. As so often happens, the historical storyline captured my attention more than the present day storyline. Even so, in this book, I will say that I was really enjoying the present day storyline. Until the ending, where the past and the present come together. Even given that the "present day" in this book is almost 35 years ago, readers are required to suspend disbelief to a certain extent. It would have worked better for me if the "present day" of this book were in 1980 even. 
• The "bad guys" were a little too stereotyped for me and very early on I was sure about the truth of one character. 

I think Wingate's fan will find this one gives them exactly what they are looking for in one of her books and new-to-her readers will find plenty to enjoy in this book. I certainly did and will be picking up more of Wingate's books, especially working on the assumption that her other books will also have an element of historical fact that she's crafted the book around.