Kickstarter Day 20 (9 to go): Hallett Peak and a slyly clever wilderness adventure novel

The Labyrinth of Flame Kickstarter is in the home stretch now - only 9 days left! (I have to say I'm so, so glad the KS hit the basic funding goal early.  I can only imagine what a little stress-monkey I'd be if I wasn't sure yet if the book could be published.  As it is, I'd love to reach the stretch goal and be able to afford interior art, but that's an "icing on the cake" thing.)  

For today's pic, I thought I'd offer up a different view of one of the peaks visible in my Kickstarter video: 12,713-ft Hallett Peak in Rocky Mountain National Park.  I took this pic on a snowshoe trip last winter:

Wintry view of Hallett Peak

Continuing with the wintry mountain theme, I'd like to bring C.J. Cherryh's clever and under-rated Rider at the Gate to your attention.  If you enjoyed the wilderness survival aspect of The Whitefire Crossing, here's another book for you.  Cherryh's characters travel through seriously badass mountains, complete with snowstorms, avalanches, and telepathic monsters.  The book is also a slyly subversive take on SFF tropes popular in the 80s/90s, in particular the "misunderstood teen bonds with telepathic animal and SHOWS THEM ALL" (see Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar novels and a zillion others).  Rider at the Gate reads like Cherryh threw down a book containing the 10-zillionth iteration of this wish-fulfillment trope and said, "Bitch, please.  Let's look at what would really happen if humans bonded to horse-like animals. Especially if the animals were predators, and the human was a emo teenage girl with a raging persecution complex."  Much as I loved all the books Cherryh is skewering, I also love her rebuttal.