I moved to Washington State more than 25 years ago. And over the years, I’ve enjoyed getting to know this place through hiking, camping, and road tripping in almost every region of the state. Of all the places I’ve visited, Olympic National Park is my favorite. Its tidepool populated coastline, its moody, mossy trails, and its magical old-growth forests full of ancient Douglas firs, Sitka spruces, and Western Hemlocks inspire me every time I visit. My picture book Log Life is a bit of a love letter to this part of the world that we are so lucky to live near.
Log Life is a story about a nurse-log habitat. It begins when a giant Douglas fir is blown over and starts a new life on the forest floor as a home to a diverse range of plants and animals. It takes place over centuries and shows how a nurse log and its little inhabitants play a big role in forest biodiversity.
During my process of creating Log Life, I visited the Olympic Peninsula in January 2020. A few days before my visit, there had been a major windstorm that had swept through and blown over many trees in the area. While on a trail near Lake Quinault Lodge, my husband and I came across a massive fallen Douglas fir tree. The tree had snapped at its base, exploding wood shards and bark onto the hiking trail. The tree’s downed 5-foot-wide trunk blocked the trail and stretched so far off into the distance that we couldn’t see the top of it.
As I crawled over the giant trunk, I wondered, How old was this tree? How long would it take to decompose? What would that process look like over the centuries? And what critters would find food and shelter here over the years? All of these questions and curiosities helped form the story of Log Life.
Since that first visit with this new nurse log five years ago, I’ve returned a few times more recently. Because this nurse log is in a national forest, there is minimal forest management, and the log remains almost as it was back in 2020. The parts of the trunk that blocked the trail have been cut and placed to the side. But the rest of the log remains to decompose naturally over the coming centuries.
I look forward to visiting it many more times in the future as it transforms over the years into a raised perch for a new forest to grow and flourish for generations to come. If you’re interested in visiting this marvelous nurse log along with many others, you can find it on the Quinault Rainforest Nature Loop trail off of South Shore Road near Lake Quinault Lodge.
Queen Anne Book Company in Seattle, WA is proud to host Amy Hevron for her Pacific Northwest Book Award celebration on Tuesday, February 11, 2025 at 6:00. There will be cake for free and books for purchase.
Watch this site for more information about the Pacific Northwest Book Award winner events hosted by independent bookstores around the region.
NWbooklovers posts original essays from this year’s award winners as featured posts in January and February. You can enjoy essays from past winners of the PNBA Book Award in our archive.
