A campfire can warm the people gathered around it, but in Darrell J. Pedersen’s second collection of North Woods reflections, the fire also represents what one generation entrusts to the next. Who Will Carry the Fire? More Reflections from a North Woods Lake considers the stories, relationships, traditions, and everyday choices that become part of a family’s and community’s inheritance. Drawing on memories of Minnesota, family life, changing times, humor, and human connection, Pedersen turns recollection toward a larger question: what deserves to be remembered, preserved, and carried forward?

Genre: Memoir

Date Published: 04-07-2025

Publisher: RiverPlace Press

Pedersen’s title gives these recollections a purpose beyond preserving personal memories. His stories repeatedly return to the people, places, traditions, and encounters that shape the way one generation understands the world before passing those lessons to another. The North Woods setting provides the foundation, but the larger concern is what remains valuable after the moment itself has passed. 

“Five Young Men And Christmas 2020” demonstrates that reflective approach particularly well. A troubling encounter on the road leads Pedersen into assumptions about several strangers, only for an unexpected act of generosity to challenge those judgments. The essay becomes less about the incidents themselves than about what they reveal concerning community, hope, human behavior, and the willingness to reconsider what we think we know about other people.

A hairy arm, plaid flannel sleeve rolled up, extended out of the pickup window and held high a fist with middle finger raised. A week before Christmas, at the end of the tumultuous year 2020, I was headed for the dump. Driving where four lane transitions to two, loud rumbling acceleration of an engine caught my attention. There he is, up ahead of me in the right lane, a big pickup. Speeding up, he slid in front of a small car. That’s when I spotted his obscene gesture. What, I wondered, did that other driver do to earn that reaction? Drawing close behind the little car, I spotted the offense. This little old lady had made the mistake of sporting a small presidential campaign sticker in her back window. I guessed giving her the finger was a victory for him. 

Witnessing this attack on humanity by a bearded young man in a big pickup caused me to reflect on his place in our society and world. I thought about the large number of bearded young men I had lately witnessed in televised protests, a few packing assault rifles. Some, recently, shouted obscenities at me and others for standing in silent support of Black Lives Matter. I wondered, has this whole generation been lost? But then I recalled, my own son is bearded and drives a noisy, old jeep, and he’s currently using his vocational skills to put together a virtual Christmas Eve service for his church. 

That was Friday. Today, Monday, my wife and I pulled into a long line outside Burger King. I immediately took notice of the young man ahead of us in the row. He was driving an old pickup, paint peeling off and rusty jagged holes in its fenders. Seeing him watching us in his mirror, I wondered if he was another of these young ruffians. 

Behind us, a brand new, red Jeep slipped into line. In my mirror I saw another young man driving. I noted huge tires, winch, fancy mirrors, decals, all the options. Lots of money for that one, I thought. I wonder what kind of a job he has? I never had money to buy something like that when I was his age. I don’t have money to buy something like that even at age 68. 

A long wait; we were one car back now. The young driver in the rusty pickup carried on an extended conversation with the window person whose hand held the outstretched plastic tub awaiting payment. Is he hassling that poor cashier? Finally, he put his credit card in the tub, received his food, and drove away. Our turn. The twenty-something man in the window, masked, said, “Your meal has already been paid for. The fellow ahead of you took care of your bill.” 

“What?”

He repeated. Bill paid. Young man in the pickup truck. $17.84.

“Well, can I pay for the people behind me?”

“Yes, if you want to.”

“Yes, please, let me pay for their bill.” His bill. I remembered; it was the young fellow in the expensive Jeep. I handed the cashier my credit card and he rang it up. 

“How much was it?”

“Just over three bucks.”

“Well, can I pay for the next car too?”

“Sure.”

“How much is that one?”

“That one is $24.95.”

“Okay, thanks, that will be just fine.”

Bill paid. Food delivered. Credit card returned. Ready to coast away, I looked my young fellow in the eye and offered, “Merry Christmas.” 

“Merry Christmas and God bless you,” he replied.

“And God bless you too,” I said to one of my new young friends at Burger King. 

Five young men just before Christmas in 2020. Pandemic, political strife, racism. So much trouble all around. Five young men and an old guy. Maybe there’s still hope.

This collection is particularly suited to readers who prefer memoir in self-contained essays rather than one continuous chronological narrative. Its emphasis on Minnesota’s North Woods, family memories, ordinary encounters, and the stories handed down through generations gives the book a strong sense of place while keeping its attention firmly on people. 

It will also appeal to readers who appreciate personal essays that include self-examination. Pedersen does not simply preserve events as he remembers them; he considers what those memories reveal about judgment, kindness, community, aging, and responsibility to the people who come after us.

Darrell J. Pedersen was raised in the 1950-60s, on a little lake in Minnesota’s North Woods. He grew up and moved away, but his heart has never left that place. His family, the lake, woods, and critters that embraced his young life taught him to appreciate today and to be hopeful for tomorrow. He learned to care for the creation and the neighbor. To leave the world a little better place than he found it. 

Since retirement, he has published his first memoir/collection of essays, Campfire in the Basement: Reflections from a North Woods Lake. One year later, Who Will Carry the Fire? More Reflections from a North Woods Lake is now in your hands. Both books include real life stories of everyday people living one day at a time in a challenging, yet amazing world. Hard work, laughter, tears, wins and losses. He believes you will find your story here too. Darrell and his wife, Jennifer, live in Baxter, Minnesota.

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The title’s question gives the collection its strongest point of connection. Pedersen’s essays suggest that carrying the fire happens through remembered names, repeated family stories, lessons learned from ordinary encounters, and the decision to preserve what earlier generations have given us. The memories belong to one Minnesota life, but the responsibility behind them is much broader: deciding which stories we will keep telling and what those stories will carry forward.

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Hayil Rufus Rose has reached thirty with a problem that threatens far more than her standing within her family: she is a werewolf who has never shifted, and her pack does not make comfortable allowances for anomalies. That private crisis sends her into the wilderness of Glacier National Park, where Secrets of the Cryptids begins widening its world in unexpected directions. 

Sharon Buchbinder brings together a cybersecurity expert facing possible exile, federal agent Will Penn and his missing brother, violence threatening the Blackfeet Nation, and a Bigfoot family whose role challenges the usual monster mythology. Underneath those elements is a question already troubling Hayil before the real danger begins—what happens when belonging depends upon becoming someone you have not yet been able to become?

Secrets of the Cryptids
Series: Cowboys and Cryptids Book 1
Author: Sharon Buchbinder
Genre: Paranormal Romance, Romantasy
Publication Date: August 3, 2026
Publisher: Sharon Buchbinder
EAN: 9798996088812

She never belonged to the pack—until fate led her to him.

Cybersecurity expert Hayil Rufus Rose has spent her life hiding one impossible truth: she’s a werewolf who has never shifted, a failure by her pack’s rules and a woman on the brink of exile. A solo hike in Glacier National Park is meant to clear her head—but instead, a chance meeting with Will Penn, a guarded federal agent with powerful instincts and secrets of his own, changes everything. 

As Hayil becomes entangled in a missing persons case involving Will’s brother, she uncovers corruption, cartel money laundering, and violence threatening the Blackfeet Nation. She forms an unexpected bond with a Bigfoot family, who are not monsters, but an ancient people who recognize her latent power. Through trauma, loyalty, and near-fatal danger, Hayil finally undergoes her full transformation, claiming her identity at last. 

Secrets of the Cryptids launches a thrilling paranormal romance series about found family, fierce hearts, and the courage it takes to become who you were always meant to be.

Hayil’s inability to shift gives the paranormal premise an unusually personal consequence. Her pack measures belonging by an ability she cannot summon, and with banishment looming, transformation is tied to family, identity, and acceptance long before it becomes part of the external adventure. Her scientific instinct adds another dimension: even while frightened about her future, she tries to reduce the mystery of her delayed transformation to facts, hormones, and inherited patterns. 

The story then reaches beyond werewolf mythology. A missing-person investigation connects Hayil and Will to corruption and cartel money laundering, while the Bigfoot family she encounters is presented as an ancient people rather than a convenient monster lurking in the wilderness. That combination of cryptid lore, romantic tension, crime, and Hayil’s struggle to claim a place in her own pack gives this series opener several mysteries to uncover at once.

Hayil had the advantage of excellent night vision—super vision compared to other humans. Plus, she possessed an almost uncanny ability to connect with most wild and domestic animals. Hayil mentally grimaced. She could also thank her grandmother for her long overdue ability to shift. What would it take to trigger her body into the lupine version of herself? Was it like a growth spurt that hadn’t hit her body yet? Or was Hayil destined to remain the one person in her pack who wasn’t able to wolf out? 

Once again, her mother’s constant refrain came back to her: “You’re a late bloomer, like your grandmother. She was older than you when she shifted. All in good time. You’ll see.” 

Sure, Mom.

Hayil knew her mother wanted the best for her, but found her cheerfulness a bit forced. Beneath her mother’s optimism, Hayil sensed an undercurrent of concern about her thirty-year-old daughter’s ability to integrate into the red wolf clan. This missing piece of Hayil’s identity called to her like a siren’s song, demanding she complete herself. Would she ever be a true part of the pack? Or would she forever be the unmated one? What then? She was an anomaly, something the pack didn’t tolerate well. Tradition dictated that if a pack member didn’t shift by the end of their third decade, they were banished. 

A chilling thought struck Hayil mid-stride.

If I don’t shift this year, will they force me out of the pack?

They were the only family she’d ever known. Her mother would fight for her to stay and would probably win. But at what cost? 

Hayil would be an outcast. She’d never be invited to pack meetings, deliberations or celebrations. Those were reserved for shifters. If she married a non-shifter, the pack would drive her out, of that she was sure. What if her offspring were able to shift? Would that make things better? Would the pack let her stay then? It wasn’t as if she could go to a genetic counselor and ask for a DNA test for werewolves. 

The thought of losing her extended family through no fault of her own made her gulp back tears. Angry at herself for allowing her thoughts to go down that dark rabbit hole, Hayil reminded herself she was a scientist. Review the facts, not the fears.

Fact one: Grandma had been in labor with Hayil’s mother when she’d shifted for the first time. 

Fact two: The majority of the pack members had shifted when they’d hit puberty. 

Fact three: Hormones! It had to be related to hormones! The rush of hormones at puberty and the flood of pregnancy hormones had to be related somehow. 

Hayil was long past puberty and the associated mood swings and acne, thank you very much. She was not ready to be pregnant. For starters, she would need a romantic partner in her life. She’d had zero luck on that score so far. 

“I still have time. It’s not too late. I won’t give up hope.”

Shaking her head to clear her mind, Hayil double-checked her wild animal deterrents. All in place. Then she tugged her knit cap down over her ears and pulled her hands-free headlamp into place. She zipped her fleece jacket against the breeze and adjusted her twenty-five-pound backpack. With an altitude gain of almost nineteen hundred feet, she planned to take her time, pacing herself for the strenuous four-hour hike. She grasped her lightweight hiking poles and took a last look up at the stars. Time to see that spectacular view at the top. 

As promised by the trail blog, the dirt path was well maintained. The morning air was cold and crisp, layered with the woodsy scent of damp earth and pine needles. An owl hooted, and Hayil spotted movement in the brush between the thick pines beside the trail. Her headlamp reflected in the eyes of small critters, all of whom skittered deeper into the woods. 

For three hours, all she heard was the crunch of her hiking boots on dirt and gravel, the rasp of her own breaths, the glug of water when she drank and the jingle of her bear bells. She looked at yet another incline on the trail and decided she needed a hiking song for inspiration. 

“Country roads, take me home,” she sang, belting out “Mountain Mama”—and something crashed through the bushes ahead on the trail. Something large. 

She froze.

An enormous black bear stood on its hind legs at the top of the hill. 

The animal had its back to her, but if it got her scent, it could turn and charge at her in a flash. 

Heart pounding like a jackhammer, she placed her hand on the bear spray. 

A breeze sprang up, making her eyes water with its intensity. The good news was that it meant she was downwind of the bear. The bad news was that the air smelled like a wet dog had rolled in a dead animal. The worst news was that the bear turned and looked right at her. 

Omigod. It’s not a bear. What the heck is it?

This is a natural fit for paranormal-romance readers who want their supernatural world to extend beyond a single kind of creature. Werewolf pack traditions provide Hayil’s immediate conflict, but Bigfoot mythology, a missing-person case, and Will’s work as a federal agent broaden the story into romantic suspense. Hayil may particularly appeal to readers who like heroines whose power has been present all along but does not arrive according to anyone else’s timetable. Her problem is not learning that she is extraordinary; she already knows exactly what she is supposed to be. The challenge is discovering what her delayed transformation means for the life and family she is afraid of losing.

Sharon Buchbinder is an award-winning author who has been writing stories since she could hold a pen. The paranormal romance genre is her writing home, a place where the impossible is simply the beginning, where women find their power in the most extraordinary circumstances, and where love is always worth the danger of seeking it. 

A Maryland-based author with a background in healthcare and higher education that has informed her vivid, grounded storytelling, Sharon is drawn to heroines who have been underestimated — women who carry something extraordinary inside them and spend the whole book learning to trust it. Sharon believes passionately that readers deserve stories where the heroine doesn’t just survive — she transforms. When she’s not writing, Sharon can usually be found unplugging in her garden, obsessing over cryptid mythology, and convincing her pets they are not, in fact, supernatural.

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Hayil enters Secrets of the Cryptids believing that one missing transformation may cost her the only family she has known. What waits beyond that fear is considerably larger: Will, his brother’s disappearance, a criminal investigation, and cryptids who complicate her understanding of who the real outsiders and monsters are. Her eventual transformation therefore carries more weight than gaining a supernatural ability. It answers a question about identity that has followed her for years while opening the door to the broader cryptid world promised by the Cowboys and Cryptids series. That mix of pack belonging, wilderness mystery, romance, and unconventional cryptid lore gives this first installment a distinctive foundation for what comes next.

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A medical breakthrough capable of repairing human cells and eliminating deadly disease would seem to represent an extraordinary victory—until control of that breakthrough becomes more dangerous than the illnesses it was designed to defeat. In Defense Mechanisms, Mo Kramer builds the threat around engineered microbes that promise regeneration while carrying consequences their creator can no longer contain. Infectious-disease physician Noah Winter is caught between the science, Dr. Balodis’s ambitions, and the escalating international pursuit that follows once those organisms begin spreading. The result is a medical crisis shaped as much by human decisions and competing agendas as by what is happening under the microscope. 

Defense Mechanisms
Author: Mo Kramer
Genre: Medical Thriller
Date Published: April 22, 2026

Can the destruction of humanity be prevented?

At an international medical conference, infectious-disease physician Noah Winter encounters the enigmatic Dr. Balodis—a visionary who claims to have engineered microbes capable of regenerating human cells, ending aging, and curing the world’s deadliest diseases. 

But the miracle comes with a terrifying cost. Balodis plans to force humanity’s evolution—and reshape the world order. Once unleashed, the organisms mutate beyond control, spreading rapidly across the globe.

Hunted by intelligence agencies, mercenaries, and Balodis’s private army, Noah must expose the truth before the cure becomes a global extinction event. 

Time is running out—and the cure may be humanity’s final mistake.

The central threat in Defense Mechanisms begins with a contradiction worth exploring: the same engineered organisms that could eliminate aging and disease could also become an extinction-level danger. That puts Noah in a situation where stopping the catastrophe means confronting technology created to accomplish something humanity would ordinarily celebrate. The scientific premise is therefore inseparable from the ethical problem of who gets to control such a discovery and what happens when one person decides that the future of the species should be engineered by force. 

The conflict also extends well beyond a laboratory. Noah is pursued by intelligence agencies, mercenaries, and Balodis’s private army while the organisms themselves continue to mutate and spread. That combination gives the book several simultaneous pressures: an evolving biological threat, a creator with his own vision for humanity, and competing groups trying to reach Noah before he can expose what is happening.

This is a strong match for thriller readers interested in stories where medicine and biotechnology create the danger rather than simply provide the backdrop. Noah’s work as an infectious-disease physician places him close to the biological problem, while Balodis’s plan raises questions about engineered evolution, longevity, and the limits of human control. The international pursuit should also appeal to readers who prefer their medical suspense mixed with intelligence operations, mercenaries, and a threat that expands rapidly beyond the people who first created it.

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Defense Mechanisms builds its suspense around a cure that cannot be separated from its consequences. Balodis believes he can alter humanity’s future through organisms designed to overcome disease and aging, while Noah is left confronting what happens when that experiment escapes its intended boundaries. The most unsettling part of the premise is not simply that the microbes mutate; it is that an apparent medical triumph creates the conditions for the catastrophe. For readers drawn to thrillers that put scientific possibility, human ambition, and global consequences into direct conflict, Noah’s race to expose the truth offers plenty to consider.

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A forced handfasting, a friendship complicated by a fated-mate bond, and an escape that creates more danger than it solves give The Duke’s Runaway Omega a particularly tangled starting point. Autumn Montague sets that conflict against an alternate Regency society where alpha and omega dynamics shape inheritance, marriage, and personal freedom. Phillip’s decision to run is not simply an attempt to avoid an unwanted match; it becomes a struggle to determine how much of his future will be dictated by family expectations, biology, and the people pursuing him. With Everett searching London and another alpha closing in for reasons of his own, romance and suspense are already tightly intertwined before Phillip discovers the complication he believed was impossible.

The Duke’s Runaway Omega
Author: Autumn Montague
Series: Fated Mates #1
Genre: LGBTQ+ Historical Romance, MPreg, Mystery & Suspense
Date Published: August 14, 2026
Publisher: Changeling Press

Phillip’s on the run, with not just one but two alphas on his trail.

Raised as an alpha, Phillip’s unexpected manifestation as an omega turns his life upside down. His father demands a handfasting, insisting Phillip be mated to whichever alpha wins the day with their pheromones. But when the triumphant alpha turns out to be his school friend Everett, Phillip realizes they are fated mates. However, as a diminished omega, his chances of bearing Ev’s children are slim. Heartbroken, Phillip flees to London. 

Everett never expected to be Duke of Harriford. His title brings a slew of distasteful marriage and handfasting offers. The latest invitation for his old friend Phillip shocks Ev into accepting. Phillip is everything he remembers and more, and Ev soon finds himself responding to the potent scent of Phillip’s pheromones. When his mate runs, Ev questions whether their feelings are true, or merely the bond of alpha and omega. Despite his fears, he’s determined to find Phillip and bring him home. 

As Ev searches London, Phillip questions the wisdom of his choices. His plans have begun to unravel rather spectacularly. To start with, he’s pregnant, the one thing he thought he’d never be. Worse, there’s an alpha hunting him -- and it’s not Ev.

Phillip’s predicament gives the familiar Regency marriage market a striking Omegaverse complication: the question is not merely whom he will marry, but whether he will be allowed meaningful control over the bond at all. His apparently weak omega manifestation also matters to the plot in more than one direction, affecting his father’s treatment of him, his assumptions about having children, and ultimately the reason his flight to London becomes even more complicated. 

Everett adds a second uncertainty because being fated mates does not automatically answer the emotional question between them. He has to consider whether what he feels for Phillip belongs to their longstanding connection or to the alpha-omega bond itself. Add the unidentified alpha pursuing Phillip, and the book has a suspense thread running alongside the romance rather than leaving the central conflict entirely in the ballroom.

This one is especially suited to readers who like Regency settings reshaped by speculative social rules rather than reproduced as conventional historical romance. The alpha/omega hierarchy directly affects inheritance, family authority, courtship, and Phillip’s ability to choose his own future, while the fated-mates element is treated as a complication that Everett himself questions rather than an instant solution. Readers who also want danger beyond the central relationship have the mystery of the second pursuing alpha to follow, and the MPreg storyline overturns one of Phillip’s most painful assumptions about himself.

Autumn grew up loving history, mythology, and all things Japanese, not necessarily in that order. This eclectic love affair has bled over into her writing, and her stories are always well spiced with the taste of Japan, strange mythological beasties, or the lords and ladies of the ton. Sometimes all three, leading to dark desires and forbidden loves. 

And after all, dangerous passions should lead to uninhibited love.

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Phillip begins the story preparing to escape a ceremony designed to decide his future for him, but London does not offer the clean break he expects. His pregnancy, Everett’s pursuit, and the presence of another alpha turn that act of defiance into a much larger question about choice and attachment. What makes The Duke’s Runaway Omega especially intriguing is that the fated bond itself is not treated as sufficient proof of love; both Phillip and Everett have reasons to question what biology is telling them. That tension, paired with the threat following Phillip through London, gives the romance room for both emotional uncertainty and genuine danger.

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