The Precipice

When two female hikers disappear in the Hundred Mile Wilderness—the most remote stretch along the entire Appalachian Trail—Maine game warden Mike Bowditch cuts short his romantic getaway with wildlife-biologist Stacey Stevens and joins the desperate search to find them.

Hope turns to despair after two unidentified corpses are discovered, their bones picked clean by coyotes. Soon, all of Maine is gripped by a fear of coyote attacks. But Bowditch has his doubts about whether the bodies belong to the missing hikers. And Stacey insists the scavengers are being wrongly blamed—and believes that a murderer may be hiding in the offbeat community of hikers, hippies, and woodsmen at the edge of the trail. When Stacey herself mysteriously goes missing, Mike’s hunt for answers becomes personal. Can he find the woman he loves before the most dangerous creature in the North Woods—man or animal—strikes again?

Bestselling author Paul Doiron is the editor in chief of Down East: The Magazine of Maine. A native of Maine, he attended Yale University and holds an MFA from Emerson College. His first book, The Poacher's Son, is the winner of the Barry Award, the Strand Award for best first novel, and a finalist for the Edgar and Anthony awards. Paul is a Registered Maine Guide and lives on a trout stream in coastal Maine with his wife, Kristen Lindquist.