Bluebird Gold follows a woman who returns to Montana after decades away to settle her father's estate and finds more than clutter when she does.
Devney Perry is best known for her bestselling romantasy Shield of Sparrows, but she's got another page-turner up her sleeve.
Bluebird Gold, out Dec. 30 from Montlake, will launch a new romantic suspense series. Set in 1983 Montana, the book follows a woman's search for the truth about her father's death and it's inspired by stories from Perry's own father, a Montana history buff.
In Bluebird Gold, Isla Poe has uprooted her life to clean out her father's absolute mess of a Montana estate, but she finds more than clutter when she does. "The more Isla learns about her father's life, the more questions she has about his death, especially as she uncovers a series of strange clues he left behind about a lost legend of Montana gold," a synopsis teases. "Was he on to something? Does someone else in Dalton know? When she gets the sinking feeling she's being watched and that she may be in danger, the handsome local sheriff, Cosi Raynes, gets involved."
Of course, Isla doesn't mean to catch feelings for Raynes (especially not since he's the single father of one of the students at the high school where she's taken a temp job). But soon, "threats to the cabin and her life intensify, so does her undeniable and very mutual attraction to Cosi," the synopsis adds. "Isla came to Montana to close a chapter of her life and move on, not fall in love and settle down. Can she do both? And, will she be able to solve her father's mystery before the person trying to stop her succeeds at keeping her quiet for good?"
"Bluebird Gold is a story I can't wait to share with the world," Perry tells PEOPLE in an exclusive statement. She explains that the book has "been in the back of my mind for years," but kept getting bumped by scheduling challenges. But now, the time has finally come for readers to discover it, too.
"I believe every story has a right time to be told, and this book came at exactly the right time," she adds. "It was one that fueled my soul, and these characters have my heart. The setting is based off a small town and mountain lake I spent summers at when I was a kid. It's nostalgic and romantic with a dash of suspense. I'm so excited to introduce readers to my fictional 1983 Dalton, Montana."
Once upon a time, I called this cabin on Cotters Lake home. As I spun in a slow circle, past swirled with present. Then and now. Then.
A crackling fireplace and the steady clicks from Mom's knitting needles. The scents of cigars and sugar cookies. A small living room, but a clean, happy room. A little girl with dirt under her fingernails curled on her father's lap as he read her a story.
Now.
Dust motes floating past dirty windows. Stale air with the faint stench of a long-dead mouse. Clutter beyond clutter to the point of chaos. A tattered recliner and lonely, quiet rooms. Dad's cabin was smaller than I remembered. The ceilings seemed too short; the walls too close.
Probably to be expected, considering the last time I'd been in this house, I'd been 16. A lot had changed in the past 10 years. Yet if I closed my eyes, I was that little girl again, curled on her father's lap. My earliest memory was in this cabin. In this living room. I'd been three, maybe four.
There was a fire burning in the stove. Dad had built it for Mom before he'd left to go ice fishing on the lake because Mom didn’t like building fires. She got splinters from the wood. Frost trimmed the windows. The couch was pushed into a corner to make space for the Christmas tree. Mom and I were decorating it with ornaments while she complained about the insufferable snow.
That was the day I’d learned what insufferable meant. Mom was upset because we’d had to cancel our shopping trip to Missoula when they’d closed the roads. I’d been too young to remember her exact words, but the way she’d spoken about Montana had always been such a contrast to Dad’s feelings. He’d been sunshine. She’d been gloom. His lifestyle had been her misery.
Until the spring I’d turned six, when the snow melted, the daffodils bloomed, and Mom loaded me into her olive-green Oldsmobile and left Dalton. Left Dad.
Mom had been lighter after that. Happier. But her joy had been the death of his laughter. Their roles had switched. She’d blossomed. He’d withered. Daylight and despair. And somewhere in the middle: me. Always in the middle. Until now. Dad was dead and there wasn’t a middle to occupy.
A shiver chased down my spine. Goosebumps dotted my forearms. The fire I’d started in the hearth was rushing to a roar, but it hadn’t chased away the cold yet. It had been 20 years since I’d spent a winter in Montana. I’d forgotten just how bitterly cold it could get. I’d been back in Dalton for a week, and the temperatures had dropped lower and lower each day.
But despite the cold, the winters were beautiful. Even Mom couldn’t argue the splendor of Montana covered in snow. Beyond the filmy windows, the sun had dipped below the jagged mountain horizon. Its fading light tinged the world in blues and violets. The trees looked more indigo than green. Beneath their trunks, the yard was blanketed with snow. Past the boat dock, the frozen lake stretched from one icy shore to the next.
Once upon a time, I’d loved that lake. I’d spent countless hours swimming, playing on the gravel beach and floating on an old inner tube. Strange that I could remember a Christmas from decades ago, but I couldn’t remember who’d taught me to swim. Was it Dad? For as long as I could remember, I’d just known how to swim. He’d been a good swimmer too. Just not good enough.
My heart twisted, the pain a constant companion this week. I’d spent most of the past week avoiding this cabin, throwing myself into my new teaching job at Dalton High School. And when I was here, I’d hidden in my childhood bedroom, huddled beneath blankets, blocking out the memories and cold. But a week of surviving in this clutter was enough.
I’d come to Montana to settle my father’s estate. To clean this cabin and sell it in the spring. To say goodbye.
Yesterday, I’d tackled the kitchen. Tonight, maybe I’d find the living room couch. It was buried somewhere beneath a mountain of boxes and bags and whatever else Dad had been collecting over the last 10 years. When I’d arrived last weekend, I’d barely been able to get into the cabin, so I’d focused on cleaning the essential rooms. The bathroom. My bedroom. The spaces I’d needed to survive my first week in Dalton.
Everything else, well ... ignorance wasn’t bliss, but it was my favorite hobby. Except there was simply no more ignoring the hoard of junk my father had amassed in this tiny house. Dad had piled boxes nearly to the ceiling, leaving only narrow paths to move from room to room. The entryway was still overloaded, mostly from stuff I’d moved off my bed so I could sleep.
Was this mess my punishment for not visiting Dad sooner? How long had he been living like this?
I should know the answer. But Ike Poe had always been a bit of a mystery, even before I’d stopped coming to Montana for my summer vacations. That mystery would remain unsolved now that he was gone.
Maybe in this sea of boxes, I’d learn more about the man my father had been before his death.
Excerpted from Bluebird Gold by Devney Perry, published by Montlake, an imprint of Amazon Publishing. Text copyright © 2025 by Devney Perry LLC.
Bluebird Gold by Devney Perry will hit shelves on Dec. 30 and is now available for preorder wherever books are sold.