THE LIGHTNING WITHIN US is literary fiction set in the isolated mountains of Central Idaho and on the rim of Hells Canyon in eastern Oregon. It is 1993, but for Lina Hudson, time stopped fifteen years ago.
In the tinder-dry summer of 1978, Lina and her twin sister Rainy were on the verge of sixteen, their once close bond fracturing apart as they struggled to find new identities in the remote Yellow River Valley.
This was the last in a series of moves for their restless and increasingly desperate parents as they sought to save their marriage. Lina's father was captivated by a treasure hunt, described in an enigmatic poem by a reclusive collector. He was convinced that he could find the treasure and change their lives forever. Absorbed in their imploding lives, neither parent notices when Lina, feeling like an outcast in this new tight-knit community, is befriended by two semi-feral teenagers who live by their own rules. Cassie and Silas show her what they call ghost trails, long-abandoned paths in the mountains that they are trying to reclaim, and stalk the outlaws who steal crystals from the rocks to sell in Boise.
With them, Lina is able to forget about her increasingly distant sister and her parents' battles. But when evil from Cassie's past returns and she is forced to make a deadly decision, events spiral into a catastrophic wildfire. Two girls go up the mountain, and only one returns.
Now, fifteen years later, Lina keeps everyone at a distance-except Joe Grider, a transient who moves in and out of her life. She is terrified that someone will find out who she is and what she did years ago. She believes she has been successful-until her father appears bearing a postcard that appears to have been written by a dead woman: Cassie. Did Cassie somehow survive? Is Lina not responsible for Cassie's death, as she has always believed?
To find out will mean returning to the town that was destroyed by fire and to the long memories of the people who live there.