The Altar Fire

At sunrise above Zermatt, the mountains turn from shadow to gold—and a man feels not comfort, but the chill of being utterly small beneath them. What can such beauty mean to a life lived in the dark of unanswered questions?

In the autumn of 1888, a reflective writer returns from Switzerland to his English home, to Maud, their children, familiar rooms—and a mind that has gone strangely silent. In his diary, domestic tenderness sits beside vast spiritual unease: he loves his family, yet cannot shield them from loneliness, loss or the mystery of what lies beyond life. And with his gift for writing seemingly spent, he must find a way back to the work that gives his days their shape. Can home, love and the ordinary duties of life answer the questions the mountains have awakened?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.