Jeffrey Rittenhouse
Six men drove thirteen hours north to a cabin on a deep lake in the Maine woods. Five of them had hunted that land for most of their lives. The sixth was learning.Every season at that cabin started the same way. Rifles checked twice. Stands tested before anyone trusted their weight to them. Long hours of sitting still while the woods decided what to show. And when a shot finally came, the hard part was only beginning.The Quiet Ground gathers twenty lessons from that deer camp, one to a page. Each one pairs a line from the novel The Cabin by the Deep Lake with plain advice an experienced hunter would give a younger one:checking your rifle and your tree stand before you trust themkeeping the wind in your face and sitting longer than feels rightpassing on the shots you should not takewaiting after the shot, marking the trail and not chasing daylightfinishing what you start and leaving the land the way you found itAt 4 x 6 inches, it fits in a jacket pocket or a day pack. It makes a good gift for a father or grandfather who has hunted for fifty years, a son or grandson heading out for his first season, or anyone who still drives north every fall.Read it the night before opening day. Then read it again next year.
