Sunrise

In 2024, Nina survives a plane crash in the remote mountains of Wyoming. Her boyfriend Ben, who was piloting the small aircraft, has vanished without a trace. Stranded on the freezing shore of a lake with meager supplies and no cell service, Nina must rely on instinct and endurance to survive. Searching for shelter, she stumbles upon Sunrise—a pristine Old West town that appears eerily preserved and utterly abandoned. It is a place steeped in legend, and somehow connected to a century-old mystery that refuses to stay buried.

In 2003, Sunrise’s hometown golden boy, Coll, oversees the town’s annual historical reenactment—until a scandal at a local bar threatens his carefully maintained reputation. When an ambitious writer begins probing the history of one of Sunrise’s most celebrated figures, Coll is forced to confront unsettling questions about the town’s past—and his own place within it.

In 1902, the town’s founder, gunslinger, and pulp-fiction hero Anton Vargas returns after a long absence and leads a search for a missing child. But Vargas is not the man the legends claim. His return raises troubling questions about what he knows—and what he has concealed.

Separated by more than a century, Nina, Coll, and Vargas are bound by Sunrise, a town whose secrets lie dormant like gunpowder—waiting for a spark. In this sweeping and atmospheric novel, Téa Obreht unravels the myths of heroism, belonging, and identity, revealing how the stories we tell shape the lives we live.