The Scouring by Joshua Veith

Sudden Quiet: Book III

The Highly Anticipated Final Installment of Joshua Veith’s Sudden Quiet Trilogy Delivers Suspense and Silver Linings

TRAVERSE CITY, MICHIGAN— “Scouring.” It’s a word that simultaneously implies discomfort and cleanliness, which was exactly what Michigan author, Joshua Veith, was going for in his newest novel, The Scouring. 

The Scouring

The third and final installment of his eco-sci-fi trilogy, Sudden Quiet, the book explores an all-too-plausible future wherein modern society has collapsed, but the things that make us most human – community, reverence for nature, and hope – have not. 

“By the time the reader finishes the third book, I want them to have a much more humanized view of these characters,” Veith said. “The title is hinting at that: is there a way to scour the planet clean of this virus, this thing that crashed us?” (No spoilers here!)

He also noted that the closure – satisfaction, even – that The Scouring provides for its key character arcs was a long time coming. (In fact, Veith added, it’s for this reason that the trilogy didn’t become a longer series). It also provides the framework for a worldview that’s been building since book one, to culminate in a national, even global, understanding for the reader. 

The End of an Era

Per Veith, the collection’s first installment, Island and Main, is hyper-regional. “Our corner of the world, from Petoskey down to Traverse City, is the setting. That’s as far as the characters can see as they explore this new darkened world,” he explained, which has crumbled after a mysterious virus wipes out the electrical grid, and with it, billions of lives. From there, he noted, the series’ sophomore installment, Dark Straits, widens the scope, imagining the Mackinac Bridge as a battleground for state control (and a dangerous thoroughfare for eco-hazards, virus superspreaders, and radical groups). 

The trilogy’s last book, The Scouring, expands the point-of-view to a national, and even global, scale. In it, readers once again follow foster siblings, Miin and Mukwa, whose green powers, alongside their story arcs, come full-circle, as they tutor the next generation; meanwhile, a key member of the Eco-ELVES group is in danger, the epicenter for Virals collapses, and the the tree-talkers work their magic as a new future for the world takes root. 

It’s an action-packed end to Veith’s debut multi-genre series. By employing layers of cultural nuance, for which the help of several Anishinaabe mentors was vital, Veith noted, he’s crafted a spellbinding story with a pair of central themes at the fore: community as a source of solace, even in the midst of circumstances as dire as global catastrophe, and the importance of connection with nature to the future of human survival. 

Author, Joshua Veith

The Author

Joshua Veith is an educator, adventurer, and outdoor enthusiast. He graduated from the University of Michigan, later earning an MA in Literature from Eastern Michigan University. Today Joshua lives with his wife and two sons in Northern Michigan, fishes and hikes in the same spots that Hemingway enjoyed as a young man, and teaches a literature class on JRR Tolkien. As a public school teacher and writer, Josh strives to be an Indigenous ally, recognizing that traditional relationships with the environment offer the most sustainable pathways for humankind’s interaction with the planet.  

The Book

Sudden Quiet III: The Scouring 

Joshua Veith

528 pages, 6” x 9”, B/W

Fiction/Science Fiction/Apocalyptic & Post-Apocalyptic/Dystopian/Nature & the Environment

ISBN: 978-1-968761-00-4, $18.95 (Softcover)

Mission Point Press, November 20, 2025

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