Ulf Pike is a fifth-generation Montanan and combat veteran. After his service in the Iraq War, he read books and wrote about them at Montana State University while fighting wildfires with the Forest Service in the summers. For the past six seasons, Ulf has staffed a fire lookout tower in Idaho with his dog Zuul. In search of a more remote duty station, he moved to Black Mountain Lookout for the 2023 fire season. He is currently working on his second book. His work has been twice nominated for the national Pushcart Prize, appearing in The Wrath Bearing Tree, SmokeLong Quarterly, 0-Dark-Thirty, and recently in Columbia University’s The Line Literary Review.