On Kingdom Mountain

I couldn't believe I could get a book for a penny that was in such great shape

This is Howard Frank Mosher's best. It is truly magical. For those of us who came of age in "The Kingdom" and some of us have even written our own books in the same setting, there is nothing like the feeling of awe for a character like Jane, a female Paul Bunyon of sorts--maybe. There is a real Lake Memphremagog. And those of us who know its reality know also that The Kingdom is also a legend unto itself. In my case, better to be observed from afar than to be there still. It's a great book and deserving of the five stars. Eric Selby

Not since A STRANGER IN THE KINGDOM (1989) has Mosher produced so tightly woven a narrative. A comedic performance, with parts of the book laugh-out-loud funny, the novel--an odd-ball romance masquerading as tall tale--is as finely crafted a piece of work as a Shaker chair or Louisville Slugger. Miss Jane Hubbell Kinneson, a k a "The Duchess" of Kingdom Mountain, is 50 years old, unmarried, and one of Mosher's most memorable and entertaining characterizations. Fiercely independent Miss Jane is a capable farmer and outdoorswoman and at home in the wild; she is also a lady of distinction, a woman of culture with some highly idiosyncratic ideas on matters literary and religious. An ex-schoolmarm and proprietor of the common bookstore and lending library, Miss Jane refers to the celebrated with less than reverence: Henry David Throeau she indicts as "Pronouncer and Proclaimer"; Shakespeare is "The Pretender of Avon"; King James, author of the King James Bible, is a "villainous imposter," and as one of her self-imposed chores, Miss Jane, something of a Pronouncer and Proclaimer herself, is revising the Bible, clarifying matters having to do, as she says, with the "Nazarene know-it-all," his disciples "the twelve fawning slackers," and his "lunatic cousin" John the Baptist. The Duchess's hardscrabble yet idyllic country lifestyle, and her beloved mountain, are threatened when town fathers, led by Miss Jane's wealthy cousin Eben Kinneson, decide to build a highway across the mountain. To stop the "Connector" Jane goes to war against the forces of so-called progress. Using her sharpshooter's rifle "Lady Justice" to good effect, she is aided in her fight by a Texas stunt-pilot named Henry Satterfield who, after crashing his Burgess-Wright biplane (the year is 1930) onto Lake Memphremagog, is given shelter by Miss Jane. Unknown to Jane, Henry, who becomes something more than houseguest, has his own agenda: recovery of 100,000$ in gold coins--loot taken from a Kingdom Common bank during Civil War years and hidden, Henry believes, somewhere on the mountain. Henry's grandfather Captain Satterfield was one of the Confederate raiders who committed the bank robbery. The search for the lost 100,000$ treasure, and Jane's fight to stop the Connector, serve as plot lines to the tale. The treasure hunt becomes somewhat convoluted in the telling but does not slow the fast pace. In any event,Jane, with her outsized character--and Henry, to a lesser degree--is the Story. Like Mosher's larger-than-life characters, Quebec Bill Bonhomme, Noel Lord, Austen Kittredge, etc., Miss Jane's depth, perspicuity, and intrepidity of spirit, makes plot somewhat academic, or at least of secondary concern. Characters from previous Mosher novels--stalwarts of the fiction--make cameo appearances in the new novel, and Mosher fans, of which I am, will be delighted to reencounter such notables as Julia "Hefty" Hefner, George "Castor Oil" Quinn, Judge Allen, Dog Cart

I've truly enjoyed every book Mosher has written (especially "Northern Borders" and "A Stranger in the Kingdom"), and his latest is another very good one. Although I thought Miss Jane was a bit too eccentric and some parts of the novel were too precious, nonetheless this story of life in northern Vermont is another wonderful read. The story is engrossing, the action is compelling, the characters are fun, and the vivid descriptions of the setting are excellent (especially since I live in Maine and have spent a large part of my life in Canada). No one writes a story like Howard Frank Mosher (incidentally, I recently talked to Richard Russo, and he is a fervent fan and friend of Mosher's); his novels are magical, heart-warming, and entertaining. I can't wait for his next book.

Set in the Northeast Kingdom, a corner of Vermont butting up against the Canadian border, Mosher's ninth "Kingdom" novel is a "character story" featuring one of Mosher's best-drawn personalities. Jane Hubbell Kinneson, almost fifty and the owner of Kingdom Mountain, is the essence of self-reliance during the Depression which has engulfed the country. Accustomed to fending for herself, she "didn't need much income. She burned her own wood, ate her own venison, moose, and trout, cultivated a large kitchen garden, cut her ice on the river, compounded her own medicines...and had no taxes or electric or phone bills to pay." A former schoolteacher, baseball coach, and bookstore owner, Miss Jane is also a prize-winning woodcarver of life-like birds. Particularly fascinated by birds "in strife," she sees strife as "the way of the world," and strife is what she has aplenty on her mountain. Her cousin Eben, a lawyer, has big plans to bulldoze a Connector road across Kingdom Mountain in the name of "progress," so that people can save time when they travel. In the early spring of 1930, as Miss Jane is hauling her ice-fishing shack across the ice of Lake Memphremagog, a spluttering biplane, identified as "Henry Satterfield's Flying Circus Rainmaking and Pyrotechnic Services" makes a crash-landing on the lake ice. Henry, injured, recuperates in her huge barn and is eventually persuaded to move into the guest room in the main house, where he stays for many months. A factor in Henry's stay is the tantalizing legend that $100,000 in double-eagle gold pieces, robbed from the local bank during the Civil War, is buried on Kingdom Mountain. Henry has acquired part of a riddle about this treasure, and he believes that Jane's deceased father may be a connection to the second half of the riddle. In this cozy, down-home novel, local color is all, and many oddball characters, their way of life, their "strifes," their family histories, and their plans for the future all give life to Kingdom Common and to the homestead on the mountain where Miss Jane reigns as "the duchess." As the seasons change, the threat of the Connector road increases, as does Henry's obsession with the gold. Though Miss Jane believes that "On Kingdom Mountain there are few coincidences, only consequences," the last sixty pages of this novel contain innumerable coincidences, each one shown to be the "consequences" of actions from a generation or more ago. The bang-up conclusion (dependent on yet more coincidences and ironies) will satisfy readers who have identified with these quirky and often charming characters. Filled with nostalgia, this novel, like many of Mosher's others, encourages the reader to "suspend disbelief," leaving him/her with a warm smile and a temporary respite from the chaotic present. n Mary Whipple Waiting for Teddy Williams Disappearances Northern Borders: A Novel A Stranger in the Kingdom: A Novel Kingdom Come: The Fiction of Howard Frank Mosher