"Horace Winter has lived an unexceptional life. Ever since that long-ago day, when the Very Bad Thing happened, he prefers to spend time with his butterfly and moth book instead of with other human beings. But when Horace retires from his job as assistant bank manager and, he struggles to adjust to a life without routine, he receives a devastating prognosis and is forced to confront the life he has (or hasn't) led. As he does, he meets Amanda. and...

At the center of this story of majesty and high mountain magic are three Magdalenas-Mary, a woman whose uncertain journey opens the book; Magdalena Mountain, shrouded in mystery and menace; and the all-black Magdalena alpine butterfly, the most elusive of several rare and beautiful species found on the mountain. And high in the Colorado Rocky Mountain wilderness, sharing the remote territory of the Erebia magdalena butterfly, lives the enigmatic...