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A River Wide

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Release Date: September 7, 2026
ISBNs:
Print: 978-1-953736-63-5
$17.99
EBook: 978-1-953736-62-8
$9.99

Now available on NetGalley
A River Wide
by Amanda J. McGee


Mountains have deep, dark hearts, and those hearts are carved by water. Deep in the shadowed hollers of Appalachia, Rhia Blackburn has always kept her powers and her heart buried. Around here, the river whispers dark secrets, the earth remembers every cut, and survival is a skill women pass down in blood. But when her cousin Amey is kidnapped up the mountain, Rhia is forced to confront the terror of her home and her own troubled history. To save her, Rhia must trust her powers—and herself—because in Appalachia, family comes first and water always finds a way.
​ 
An Appalachian horror novella about family, grief, and the stubborn strength it takes to survive.  
About the Author 
Short Bio (personal):
Amanda J. McGee is a planner by day and a writer by night. When not writing, Amanda
can be found reading books or hiking mountains, depending on the season. You can
find out more on her website at http://amandajmcgee.com.

Long Bio:
Amanda J. McGee is a planner by day and a writer by night. She has degrees from
Hollins University and Virginia Tech, where she studied languages, identity politics,
policy, and infrastructure. She is the author of the dark epic fantasy series The Creation
Saga and is an Art Matters Grant recipient, a program of the City of Roanoke and the
National Endowment of the Arts. Her novella “Viridian” was published in the anthology A
SINISTER QUARTET, which made the 2020 Locus Recommended Reading List.
When not writing, Amanda can be found reading books or hiking mountains, depending
on the season. She lives in Southwest Virginia with the love of her life, two fluffy cats,
and a plethora of plants. You can find out more on her website at
http://amandajmcgee.com.

Twitter: @skylit1
Facebook: facebook.com/amanda.mcgee13
Instagram: @amcgee.writes
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@amcgeewrites13
Patreon: patreon.com/amcgee
Mastodon: @[email protected]

A Sinister Quartet
https://mythicdelirium.com/our-books-8

Mother of Creation
https://www.amazon.com/Mother-Creation-Saga-Book-ebook/dp/B00LQUHRV8/

Daughter of Madness
https://www.amazon.com/Daughter-Madness-Book-Creation-Saga-ebook/dp/B07BPB2HK9/
​
About the Cover Artist 
Dante Luiz is an illustrator and occasional writer from an island in southern Brazil. He’s the interior artist for Crema (comiXology/Dark Horse), and his work with comics has also appeared in anthologies, like Wayward Kindred (TO Comix Press), Mañana: Latinx Comics From the 25th Century (Power & Magic Press), and Shout Out (TO Comix Press), among others. Find him online on Twitter and Instagram (@dntlz), or his website (danteluiz.com).

Praise for A RIVER WIDE
 

“An Appalachian murder ballad for the twenty-first century, Amanda McGee’s nail-biter of a novella shows us why it’s dangerous to be a witch and dangerous to cross one. At the same time, A River Wide overflows with joys and sorrows that arise from the deep blood ties of family, drawing from profound wells of grief and hope to brew a ghost-haunted spell.” —Mike Allen, World Fantasy and Shirley Jackson award-nominated author of Trail of Shadows

“A River Wide pulled me in with narrator Rhia's vivid voice, a small town's secrets, and a kind of elemental witchcraft I hadn't seen before. Rather than bend water to her will, Rhia must work with it, sometimes even bargain with it—and she can't take that lightly, even when what she's bargaining for amounts to her sister's life. I hope McGee has more plans for the witches of the Blackburn family and the Appalachian home they so lovingly, so precariously, inhabit.” —Laura Blackwell, Shirley Jackson Award-winning author
 
“Like Alice Hoffman’s Practical Magic, and Amal El-Mohtar’s The River Has Roots, Amanda J. McGee’s novella A River Wide taps the bonds of sisterhood, survival, and power, and floods the senses with river water and witchcraft. McGee’s characters have a deep, Dillard-esque, and—dare I say—holy bond with the Appalachian landscape, which can be capricious, cruel, generous, or tender in turns, much like the prose itself. A River Wide wanders deftly into various creeks and hollows of genre: thriller, ghost story, romance, family drama, and a middle-of-life coming-of-age. It moved me, deeply.” —C. S. E. Cooney, World Fantasy Award-winning author of Saint Death’s Daughter


Important Links

Publisher's Insta: https://www.instagram.com/interstellarflightpress/
Author's website: https://amandajmcgee.com/
Author's Insta: https://www.instagram.com/amcgee.writes/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/252039367-a-river-wide

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  • Home
  • Books
    • Poetry >
      • Twelve
      • Field Guide to Invasive Species of Minnesota
      • Can You Sign My Tentacle?
      • Escaping the Body
      • The Gravity of Existence
      • Beautiful Malady
      • anOther Mythology
      • The Heartbeat of the Universe
      • Necessary Poisons
      • listen—a poetic creature
      • Bury My Heart Under the Martian Sky
    • Fiction >
      • The Manticore's Vow
      • Local Star
      • Shelter Trilogy
      • Killday Series
      • The Long Fall Up
      • Small Gods of Calamity
      • Learning To Hate Yourself as a Self-Defense Mechanism
      • The Butterfly Disjunct
      • The House of Illusionists
      • Club Magritte
      • Sweetside Motel
      • The Forgetting Navigations
      • Grief Eater
      • A River Wide
    • Nonfiction >
      • Best Of Interstellar Flight Mag
  • Magazine
    • Masthead
    • 2020 Alternate Endings
    • 2024 Flash Fiction Series
    • Infinite Branches: Speculative Disability Poetry in Conversation >
      • Blackberry Ball
      • burn (kiss) the heretic
      • goddess in forced repose
      • Ah Yes, the Trick
      • The Person Who Reminds the Other Person to Cast a Spell
      • Things I Carried Coming Into This World
      • a bird in the palm makes for a fantastical t4t date
      • Vwylen in the Arboretum (Feels like a Whore)
      • Fourteen
  • Submissions
  • About
    • Staff
    • Contact
    • Media