New novel claws through silence on poverty, violence, and the wild ways children learn to survive
Author Janis Flores has unleashed a story that does not tiptoe around the dark corners of childhood. Ruby arrives in print and digital editions today, and it isn’t here to soothe. It is here to bite.
The book follows twelve-year-old Ruby Fairchild in the remote Idaho mountains. Her life: a cramped shack, an unpredictable mother whose beauty is fading into rage, and a revolving door of men who see a child’s fragility as an opening. Against this, Ruby stumbles into something extraordinary, a white wolf she names Waya. Later, his mate, Luna. They become her refuge. Not fantasy, not a Disney sidekick. Real wolves, flesh and fur and danger, offering more steadiness than any human around her.
Why this book matters now
Too many stories about hardship soften the edges, polish away the bruises. Ruby refuses. It looks straight at the violence and the neglect and still finds a glimmer in the bond between a girl and the wilderness that shelters her. In a cultural moment where people are questioning what “family” means, Flores delivers a narrative that says family may come in unexpected forms, sometimes blood, fur, sometimes not human at all.
About the author
Janis Flores isn’t interested in playing safe. She writes with the grit of someone who has seen small towns chew people up, who knows the sound of slammed doors and the quiet after. Flores grew up around working-class families in the rural West, carrying those memories into fiction. Her prose has been described as “savage and tender in the same breath.” She wanted Ruby to feel like overhearing a secret you weren’t supposed to know.
Praise and early comparisons
Advance readers have called Ruby “a raw heir to Where the Crawdads Sing with teeth marks left behind,” and “a novel that trusts children to understand what most adults avoid.” Early reviewers note Flores’s ability to write about violence without sensationalism, pairing it with startling moments of beauty, such as a girl’s hand on a wolf’s flank or snow falling in perfect silence after chaos.
A call for readers who crave more
Ruby is not a quiet book. It’s a howl in the night, a dare to look closer at the stories we’d rather ignore. If you’ve grown tired of neat, softened coming-of-age tales, this one will undo you in the best way.
Available now wherever books are sold.
For more information or to order a copy, visit Amazon or request Ruby from your local bookstore.