Shimmering Lake Summer Camp

A boy who thinks he's the only strange thing in the world, and a girl who knows that she isn't…The first instalment in the Shimmering Lake Summer camp series, Whisper in the Woods follows Ronnie and Morgan, two teenagers with turbulent home lives, as they attend the first session of a summer camp focused on helping troubled youth connect to each other, themselves, and the world around them.Ronnie has just been through a traumatizing event that he can't understand, and is being left in the dark about it by his own mother. Meanwhile, he struggles to piece together why he's been raised to believe he and his mother are the only vampires in the world.Like most things in Morgan's life, going to camp was sprung on her without her consent, but it gets her away from her painful home life and offers a glimpse into the world of Silent Woods, where she, a werewolf, might find more belonging than the suburbs of Ottawa.But there's more to the camp than what anyone is telling them, and a long standing conflict is bubbling up in the lake…Trigger warnings for this story include: abusive parents (verbal), parent death, physical assault and flashbacks, mental health struggles, animal death on screen, transphobia.

This first short story collection in the Shimmering Lake Summer Camp series sheds light on the lives of the 2018 and 2019 campers, delving into their childhoods and exploring their futures in chronological glimpses. Join the campers as they narrowly miss (and not quite miss) encounters with kelpies, attend a first pride parade, meet another werewolf in an unexpected place, move into new homes, and experience the difficulties and wonders of their lives. Through everyday actions to intense life-changing moments, these stories explore how this group of young adults navigate the changes of a global pandemic and the challenges that come with growing up.