Excerpt: 'Then There Was No Mountain'

Jan. 19 -- Then There Was No Mountain by Sam and Ellie Waterston is the gripping story of a mother who comes to terms with her daughter's drug addiction. Sam Waterston, Ellie's brother, is a longtime star on Law & Order.

Here is an excerpt.

ONE: Poplars

I was folding laundry with the phone cupped between my ear and shoulder.A cattle truck driver had called needing directions to our feedlot. Sophie,three, sat playing near me on the kitchen floor. Her brother, Nick, and sister,Isabelle, were at the one-room schoolhouse twelve miles down the road.Theirfather? No idea. At this point he was never where he said he was. And Ididn't care. Every minute he was out of the house was a gift. It meant noyelling, no insults. Sophie pushed her way out the screen door. I heard it slamand saw her toddle around the corner of the house past the kitchen window,headed in the direction of the sandbox. She managed to keep her balance despitethe friendly nudgings of our dogs.

"The highway number out of Biggs? Just one second." I put down thephone to search for the road atlas. "It's Highway 30. 6:00 tonight? See youthen."

"Sophie?" I called, walking outside, expecting an instant response to giveme a reading on her location. No answer. "Sophie!" I scanned the yard-nosign of her. I ran all the way around the house, and then back inside, throughevery room, despite knowing she had gone out, despite my certainty shewasn't in the house at all. Searching under the beds, behind the doors helpedme postpone dealing with the possibility that loomed larger and larger: the irrigationditch.The thought paralyzed me with fear. "Sophie!" I screamed, finally running back outside, my hand holding my heart inside my chest.Thedogs joined in, ran along with me, as though it were a game. I kicked at themout of rage and fear. I looked to the left and then to the right down the ditchthat ran along the row of tall poplars that shadowed our house."SOPHIE!"I finally got enough of a grip on myself to walk slowly along the narrowcanal, looking for her in her floral sun suit, white sandals, and floating facedown, her blond curls riding the gentle drift of the ditch water.