Brother & Sister Enter the Forest

By: Richard Mirabella

Narrated by: Eve Passeltiner

After years of severed communication, Justin appears on his sister’s doorstep needing a place to stay. The home he's made for himself has collapsed, as has everything else in his life. When they were children, Willa played the role of her brother’s protector, but now, afraid of the chaos he might bring, she’s reluctant to let him in.

Willa lives a carefully ordered life working as a nurse and making ornate dioramas in her spare time. As Justin tries to connect with the people she’s closest to—her landlord, her boyfriend, their mother—she begins to feel exposed. Willa and Justin’s relationship has always been strained yet loving, frustrating and close. But it hits a new breaking point when Justin spirals out of control, unable to manage his sobriety and the sustained effects of a brain injury.

Years earlier, in high school, desperate to escape his home life and his disapproving, troubled mother, Justin falls into the hands of his first lover, a slightly older boy living on his own who offers Justin some semblance of intimacy and refuge. When Justin’s boyfriend commits a terrifying act of violence, the two flee on a doomed road trip, a journey that will damage Justin and change his and his family’s lives forever.

Weaving together these two timelines, Brother & Sister Enter the Forest unravels the thread of a young man’s trauma and the love waiting for him on the other side.

©2023 Richard Mirabella (P)2023 Dreamscape Media

Hauntingly beautiful.

Like dreaming of a past life. These characters are achingly real, and Mirabella seats you at the table beside them.

Truth, beauty, and all you need to know

This book teaches us to examine our own identity through horror, pain and love. When you take all of these things apart, sometimes they don't go back together again the same way.

Can’t turn away

This story is about two years old for me and I didn’t like it in the end, but I kept running into it in my head..
The characters are a mixture sour and unconditional love
And trying to navigate this dark woods of circumstances.
You really feel the love and affection in the writing.
I may have not been a big fan of the story but it’s a beautiful one ….. fans of film the Mysterious Skin may like this story

A savage pretty thing

Mirabella skillfully brings us into the pain and fragile beauty of sibling relationships in the face of subtle and grotesque trauma. Very well written.

Great story!

This story is relatable and raw. There are moments you want to strangle the characters and then love them. I didn’t enjoy the performers character voices. Takes a few minutes to focus on what she’s saying rather than how she’s saying it and this is possible because the story is just that good.