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THE MOUNTAINS MAY DEPART

$19.95

In THE MOUNTAINS MAY DEPART, a year has passed since Dan and Sarah lost their four-year-old son in a car accident—one Sarah caused. Dan spends each dawn running through the streets of Missoula, pounding the pavement in an effort to outrun the grief, guilt, and fierce love that have knotted themselves inside him. He wants to be the strong one, the forgiving one, but every attempt to soothe Sarah falls apart, and lately he’s shocked to realize he’s noticing an attractive young colleague at work, a sign of how far off-center he’s drifted.

Sarah, meanwhile, wakes every morning to pray to a God who seems to turn away from her pleas. She kisses Dan on the stairs, feels the widening fracture between them, and believes that leaving might be the most merciful act she can offer. A new, frightening prayer has slipped into her heart: If you don’t want me to go, stop me. But no divine roadblocks appear, and she has begun—quietly, methodically—to plan her departure.

Set against the rugged landscape of Missoula, Montana, this novella is an intimate exploration of grief, marriage, and the brutal, bewildering work of forgiveness. A 2019 Finalist for the Clay Reynolds Novella Prize and a 2020 Honorable Mention for the Landmark Prize for Fiction, the book also appeared in excerpt in The Windhover in 2021.

In THE MOUNTAINS MAY DEPART, a year has passed since Dan and Sarah lost their four-year-old son in a car accident—one Sarah caused. Dan spends each dawn running through the streets of Missoula, pounding the pavement in an effort to outrun the grief, guilt, and fierce love that have knotted themselves inside him. He wants to be the strong one, the forgiving one, but every attempt to soothe Sarah falls apart, and lately he’s shocked to realize he’s noticing an attractive young colleague at work, a sign of how far off-center he’s drifted.

Sarah, meanwhile, wakes every morning to pray to a God who seems to turn away from her pleas. She kisses Dan on the stairs, feels the widening fracture between them, and believes that leaving might be the most merciful act she can offer. A new, frightening prayer has slipped into her heart: If you don’t want me to go, stop me. But no divine roadblocks appear, and she has begun—quietly, methodically—to plan her departure.

Set against the rugged landscape of Missoula, Montana, this novella is an intimate exploration of grief, marriage, and the brutal, bewildering work of forgiveness. A 2019 Finalist for the Clay Reynolds Novella Prize and a 2020 Honorable Mention for the Landmark Prize for Fiction, the book also appeared in excerpt in The Windhover in 2021.

Praise for THE MOUNTAINS MAY DEPART

"This is a beautiful book. Short, sweet, tough, brave, tender, resilient, heartbreaking, true. All that. This story of a young married couple trying to find a way through the deepest grief imaginable is, finally, about love and God and who we are when we inevitably wrestle with the meaning of both. Ryan Rickrode has written a terse and beguiling and remarkably beautiful novel. Read this."

Bret Lott, bestselling author of Jewel, an Oprah’s Book Club selection

"Throughout this novella, Ryan Rickrode not only masterfully interweaves both points-of-view as a husband and wife consider fleeing from a marriage wounded by tragedy, but also uses that struggle to explore the fundamental search for life’s meaning and purpose, a universality that should engage a wide variety of readers."

 Gary Fincke, author of The Out-of-Sorts: New and Selected Stories

 

"How does a couple survive the greatest grief they can imagine? In The Mountains May Depart, Dan and Sarah McDermott find themselves in such a situation. As they mourn the loss of the their young son, they struggle to reassemble their lives even while they drift apart from one another and wrestle with their faith. Allowing readers into each spouse's perspective, Ryan Rickrode evocatively and lyrically reveals the nuances of how this couple navigates a new world they hadn't anticipated and how their actions and their views of each other powerfully affect their future."

Nathaniel Lee Hansen, freelance editor and former editor-in-chief of The Windhover

 

"Grief isolates Rickrode's characters; it is the fulcrum upon which their agony seesaws. Should they fight or flee? Forgive or forget? Is it possible for a couple polarized by the tragic loss of their young son to forgive each other and start again? Rickrode walks a daunting tightrope between tension and disclosure. The juxtaposition of what is thought versus what is said when two people are poisoned with resentment is maddeningly authentic and forces us to examine how we resist choosing love in our own lives. This book is a small whirlwind!"

 Tara Stillions Whitehead, author of The Year of the Monster

 

Playlist for THE MOUNTAINS MAY DEPART

 

About RYAN RICKRODE

Ryan Rickrode is the author of The Mountains May Depart and Accidents Will Happen: Essays & Photos. He received his MFA in fiction and creative nonfiction from the University of Montana in 2013 and has been writing and teaching in Central Pennsylvania ever since. As a senior lecturer in English at Messiah University he teaches courses on creative writing, composition, and literature. As a writer he's interested in the ways narratives shape people, the ways in which faith and art can overlap, and the ways in which familiar stories like fairy tales can be made new once again. His shorter work has appeared in various places, including Dappled Things, The Windhover, and The Cresset. You can read more of his work at ryan-rickrode.com.

 

  • Genre: fiction / novel

    ISBN: 978-1-963115-80-2

    Publication Date: APRIL 7, 2026