Nick of the Woods (Illustrated)

KENTUCKY, 1782. THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND.

In the East, the war for American independence is nearly won. Beyond the mountains, it has merely changed its shape. Kentucky is not yet a state. It is border country: forest, river, scattered stations behind timber walls—and between them a wilderness in which law, news, and rescue may lie days away.

Into that country rides Roland Forrester, a young former officer of the Continental Army, accompanied by his cousin Edith. They have come west to recover a lost inheritance and begin another life. Instead they enter a land already at war. Betrayal follows them. Old claims turn deadly. Every trail may be watched; every clearing may conceal an enemy.

And through the deeper forest moves something of which the borderers speak only in lowered voices. The Shawnee call it the Jibbenainosay. The settlers have another name. Nick of the Woods.

First published in 1837, Robert Montgomery Bird's dark frontier masterpiece stands against the romantic wilderness of James Fenimore Cooper. There is no pastoral Eden here. The forest is refuge and battlefield, road and grave; a place where courage and cruelty, faith and vengeance, civilization and savagery are driven into terrible proximity. A novel from the hour when the edge of America was also the edge of law.

Complete and unabridged, in an editorially renewed text preserving Bird's historical vocabulary, dramatic voices, and savage narrative force.

Dr. Bird’s great excellence is in the ingenuity and contrivance of his story. This could not be so told as not to be interesting.

Southern Literary Messenger, April 1837

First published: 1837

Discover the book and its artwork on our English Instagram profile.