This character possesses skills that stand them in good stead whether they are the pursuer or the pursued.

This character will use those skills not just to keep the proverbial wolves from the door, but to make what appears – in the moment – the ultimate sacrifice.

This character will shape-shift to survive, stepping into roles that will test their empathy, loyalty and resilience. They will surprise their enemies.

They will learn that victory means someone is vanquished in a zero-sum game.

This character inspires trust, optimism, courage and confidence in the people around them but this character is not without self-doubt.

One critic said this character “could not be contained.”

Do you know who this character is? And who created this character? When you have the answer, email me at: kmiller@mpr.org.

On the winter night of our first acquaintance with Tom Rourke, he’s penning love letters, preening in mirrors, pushing dope, partaking of booze, singing and flirting and fighting.

It’s just another night in Montana for the feckless young Irishman.

Kevin Barry’s new novel, “The Heart in Winter,” unfolds in 1891 where the men of Ireland and Cornwall arrived by the thousands to work the mines.

In one scene, Barry writes: “The top of the town at that time was only just getting built up and there wasn’t many people living there yet but more and more were arriving every day … and there were men carrying the lumber and banging it all together and singing these bawdy type songs in what must have been the Irish tongue.”

But the arc of Tom Rourke’s life will go wildly askew when he meets a woman – married to someone else – wild in the ways that bewitch Rourke and eager to keep pushing west.

It is both romantic and comedic, subtle and sly.