A womanÕs story, unearthed by silence, shaped by wind.
In the borderlands of southern Arizona, Birgit returns to a desert town she once passed through, this time, seeking something more lasting. A quiet life. A rooted home. A place where the past can settle and something sacred might take root.
San Aluna is no ordinary town. Memory clings to its adobe walls. The wind carries voices. And in the rhythms of ritual and daily work, Birgit begins to sense that the land itself is listening. What it asks of her, however, will blur the line between the life sheÕs building and the one thatÕs been quietly shaping her all along.
At her side is Luca, her partner and co-creator, a man formed by ancestral ritual and quiet devotion. In his kitchen, food becomes offering, meals steeped in memory, silence, and something just shy of prayer. In the spaces between them, Birgit begins to hear what she had long tuned out: ancestral pull, forgotten truths, and the possibility that staying may ask more of her than leaving ever did.
Told in cinematic fragments, journal entries, spare haiku, and voice-rich prose, She Who Holds the Wind is a richly textured novel of feminine reckoning and spiritual inheritance, drawn from true events and lived experience. A story where silence carries meaning, presence becomes prayer, and the most profound transformations begin not with answers, but with the courage to remain.
OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2026 Tucson Festival of Books - Indie Author Pavilion
FINALIST: 2025 American Writing Awards - Women's Fiction
"A lush and atmospheric concoction of a woman's longing made tangible and the exploration of her own intrinsic essence. Dunbar Chace's characters are at once palpable and poetic, and Birgit's story blends a yearning for the sustenance of belonging with the beckoning of ancestral connection that underpins it." Mimi Rea - Writer, Foodie, Culture Lover
"What I got most from your books was how I have gone for so long without really feeling. I used to feel so connected to the universe but for some time now just been emotionally cruising on autopilot. Your writing really made me realize that and seemed to bring me back to the ground." Michael A - Oceanside CA
"What a beautifully written novel depicting an endearing love story, with undertones of a poetic and mysterious supernatural touch. The beautiful descriptions of the desert landscape as the reader journeys to their destination fill the reader with awe." Monica Smith - Tucson, AZ, She Who Holds the Wind, Kiersten Dunbar Chace, Literary Fiction, Ancestral memory, Spiritual realism, Cross-cultural romance, Kiersten Dunbar Chace| | 362PAGES