Dirtpickers

In a remote valley in Idaho in 1981, a man, a woman and three children stop running to wash the blood from their hands and bodies. They are the few survivors of a terrible tragedy. Their only choice now is, somehow, to become a family.

Five years earlier, Opal and her husband James arrive at a small mining community in the Silver Valley, drawn by promises of fortune and independence. There they meet Baron Rowe, the charismatic visionary who controls the community with an iron fist.

Baron's son Denny has spent his life trying, and failing, to live up to Baron's expectations, and to protect his little sister Maude from their father's excesses.

Soon, a tragic accident will change all their lives. And five years later, change will come again at the barrel of a madman's gun.

Crossing the border into Canada, Opal, Denny, Maude, little Billy and the baby find refuge in a remote hunting cabin and in the generosity of the widowed Mrs Schweers.

As these five become Ma, Da, Bunny, Bear and Baby, they must unlearn all they have known, tend to wounds old and new, and start afresh.

Dirtpickers is a heart-swelling beauty of a debut novel of trauma and found family, from an incredible new literary talent.

Written in exquisite lyrical passages, the novel moves between the four main characters, shuffling back and forth in time, to create a story that will live long in the reader's memory.

Ideal for readers who:

• Read literary fiction for found family, trauma recovery and the slow work of trust.
• Come for the Idaho mining setting to shape the characters as much as the plot.
• Appreciate layered timelines and lyrical prose that ask for close attention.
• Feel moved by survival stories where home has to be invented from almost nothing.

ISBN

9781786586636

Format

Paperback

Publisher

Manilla, (21 May 2026)

Number of Pages

352

Language

English

Dimensions

234 x 153 mm

Categories:

Sense of Place Love and Relationships Identity and Belonging Death Grief Loss General and literary Family Life