Kit's Wilderness left me with a dark, anxious, and insecure feeling as if I were wandering in a bleak and barren moonlit forest in December. Young Kit Watson moves back to his family's home-town to help care for his grandfather after his grandmother's death. Needing friends, he is drawn to accept an invitation to play the game of "death" by a collection of kids in the town. The game opens his mind to the realm of his dead ancestors who once mined in the town and filling his mind with visitations of creepy, strange ghost-children of the past.

Kit supposedly uses his visions of the past and his writing skills to help shape and discover the light in his friend John Askew, but while forcing myself through this book, I never felt like there was actually a plot. Most pages felt like scene descriptions of empty and lonely places. This book just made me feel gloomy and dark. I do not think any young adult would enjoy this book; any awards it has won were clearly bestowed by adults.