Thirty-four years have passed since Kevin Reynolds perpetrated the most heinous crime the citizens of Carver, Montana, had ever witnessed in their small, alpine community. Now, Kevin's great nephew, Mitch, has found a bundle of old letters written by Kevin to his father in 2001, the year of Kevin's execution. His curiosity piqued, Mitch has recruited two of his good friends to hike up to the Blind Valley caldera and scout out the scene of the crimes of 1969 and to try to find the hidden cave where the old mountain man, Sam Elliott, once lived. As far as the boys are concerned, their trip to Blind Valley is supposed to be a six day expedition filled with the sights and smells of the wilderness. What they expect to find is a fascinating new world high atop Oriel Peak, resting in a sugar bowl valley Mitch's cousin Kevin referred to as Short Pines. So what do they find? A seemingly peaceful valley, the floor of which is thickly forested with stunted evergreens and ringed with high granite cliffs overhanging the edges of the bowl-like valley. The three friends find that the Blind Valley caldera is a place of great beauty and serenity, yet it is someplace very much more unworldly than they ever could have imagined....