A Good Animal

Coming February 2026 from St. Martin’s Press

In the farm fields surrounding Sault Ste. Marie, a border town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, time seems to stand still. Most kids dream of leaving, but Everett Lindt plans to stay on his family's sheep farm, develop his own herd, and eventually rebuild the crumbling homestead that looks over the land he loves. When he meets Mary, a Coast Guard brat determined to set out on her own, he soon feels he can’t live without her. After she discovers she's pregnant, he's convinced she'll stay by his side forever. Mary, however, is desperate to find a way out. With limited access to reproductive care, Everett and Mary discover a solution with potentially disastrous consequences.

Intimate and haunting, A Good Animal is a breathtaking story of the complexities of love, the beauty and brutality of rural life, and how one decision can echo through generations and shape who we become.