A girl is found in the woods and a tangle of secrets unravels. Can Vivian trust her impressions? Can she trust anyone?
"The heart of another is a dark forest, always, no matter how close it has been to one’s own." --Willa Cather
When Vivian and her husband Nowell are enlisted to prepare his late grandmother’s house for sale, they decide to take a break from city life. Nowell leaves before his wife to begin work on his second mystery novel, and by the time Vivian joins him in the country, a real mystery has begun. A local girl has died in the woods behind the house. Nowell’s brother, a shiftless and rough sort, arrives with his new wife, and details begin to emerge about the girl. Vivian is enmeshed, even after the death is ruled an accident. She can't forget it, can't ignore the strange behavior of the lonely bachelor who lives nearby. Meanwhile, her marriage is unraveling as Nowell loses himself in his work and Vivian seeks purpose and truth.
The Qualities of Wood is about the things we tell and sell ourselves to get by. It’s about impressions about the past and present, and whether they can be trusted. And it’s about the difficulty of relationships and the subjectivity that makes us uniquely human.