Longlisted for the Women's Fiction Prize
Mummy never yells. Mostly not ever. Except sometimes.
Anna is five. Her little brother, Stick, is almost three. They are camping with their parents in Algonquin Park, in three thousand square miles of wilderness. It's the perfect family trip. But then Anna awakes in the night to the sound of something moving in the shadows. Her father is terrified. Her mother is screaming. Then, silence.
Alone in the woods, it is Anna who has to look after Stick, battling hunger and the elements to stay alive. Narrated by Anna, this is white-knuckle storytelling that captures the fear, wonder and bewilderment of our worst nightmares - and the power of one girl's enduring love for her family.

Claire Cameron is a novelist and writer, whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Globe and Mail, and The Rumpus. She worked as a wilderness instructor for Outward Bound and in the early 1990s led canoe trips at a summer camp in Algonquin Park in Canada. This story is inspired by her experiences there. She now lives in Toronto with her husband and two children.