After I retired from bookselling, it was fun to reflect on the many events and authors that Fact & Fiction hosted. I still marvel at the talented writers that call Montana home. This Spring and Summer many new books of interest to Montanans were released, but fortunately people from all states can read them. Here are some books you might have missed:
Home Waters: A Chronicle of Family and a River by John N. Maclean
Home Waters is about a family and a river. A place that many have become familiar with because of a book and a film called A River Runs Through It. Perhaps this can be called the rest of the story, as John Maclean recalls time spent at a Seeley Lake cabin in his memoir of fathers and sons, the lore of fly-fishing, and importance of nature. Woodcuts by Wesley W Bates, maps and photographs make this a beautiful book and rightful tribute.
In nine chapters, the reader learns more about Reverend Maclean, Paul’s mysterious death, Norman’s achievements and frustrations as an author. Montanans will recognize the names of family friends including: Jack Boehme, George Croonenberghs, K Ross Toole, Theodore Geisel, Paul Dornblaser, Elers Koch, AJ and Maud Gibson and Don Mackey. Neighborhoods, rivers, local history, fishing flies, larch trees and fire are revisited as the author takes his place in the generations that are haunted by water.
From the epilogue: “I do not fish alone on the Blackfoot, ever, even though now I mostly fish it by myself. When I’m on the water, and especially when no one else is around, I feel the presence of generations of my family whose stories run through it.”
Welcome to Pheasant Run, a senior residence center in Montana, where many of the residents feel lost and forgotten. Cassie McMackin is counting pills and contemplating suicide; Viola Six is worried about paying the rent after losing her savings in a scam; Leo Umberti, formerly an insurance agent, now spends his days painting abstract landscapes as he mourns a long-ago loss; and Rydell Clovis desperately to stay fit enough to restart a career in academia.
Herbie Bonebright is the new manager of the building is trying to oust tenants in a scheme to convert Pheasant Run into a more profitable venture. When a fire breaks out in Herbie’s apartment, the city’s chief fire inspector, Lander Maki finds the fire highly suspicious. Viola has disappeared. So has Herbie. And a troubled teen, Clayton Spooner, was glimpsed fleeing the scene.
People of all ages want to feel secure, loved, and needed. The issues of assisted living companies converting portions of their facilities into high-cost memory care units; maintaining a home on a limited income; and elder abuse make this more than a mystery. It is a look into the vulnerable transitional lives of both teens and the elderly.
Three new books by debt authors provide excellent reading:
At age 15 Catherine Raven left home to work as a National Park Service ranger. She eventually earned a college degree and a PhD in biology; built a home off the grid in Montana; taught remotely; and lead field classes in Yellowstone. “Now, six years after leaving university, having gone back to the wilderness, and back to the academy and back to the wilderness again, I met a wild thing: a fox. The fox was alluring, almost magical. But the timing was inconvenient.”
Raven had recently been offered a permanent job with benefits, a chance for social acceptance, when the fox began to appear on her property every day at 4:15. She never had a regular visitor before, so she sat in a camping chair and read aloud to her guest every day from The Little Prince. From the fox, she learned an important thing about loneliness: we are never alone when we are connected to the natural world. Fox and I is a tale of solitude and belonging, the story of one woman whose immersion in the natural world will make all readers examine how they view their surroundings—each tree, weed, flower, stone, or fox.
To say that Keema Wakefield had a unique childhood is an understatement. She grew up on the Alaskan folk festival circuit with her young motivated mother, two siblings and cast of musicians, drunks, and several stepdads. All the while she wanted a place to call home. Wakefield wanted to know more about her father, learn her true birthdate but instead found a true bond with her mother.
From the beginning of the Acknowledgements:
"I handed my mother the first draft of this book several years ago, saying, “I never have to publish this.” She read it through the night, and I woke up intermittently to the sound of her laughing and crying in the room next door. In the morning she hugged me. “This is your story,” she said. “It’s beautiful. It’s hard. It’s true. You don’t need my permission to tell it. But you have it, if you want it.” I may never be able to thank my mother adequately for the freedom she has given me to tell the story of our growing-up-together years.”
Inside Passage is the story of a heartbreaking life, beautifully told.
Army veteran Cassie Gale is on a solo trip from Montana to the Alaska wilderness where she has accepted a summer job with High Water Rafting Expeditions. But she never arrives. Searchers find her abandoned campsite, she has vanished. Cassie has been kidnapped. She wakes up in a Russian prison.
As it turns out, Cassie’s not the first person to disappear without a trace in this remote Alaskan location. There are many ways to die in the wilderness. But not all disappearances can be explained. Cassie’s is one of them, along with a number of other outdoor enthusiasts who have vanished in recent years. Is there a clue at The Northern Breeze Lodge & Smoke House Bar?
Meanwhile, her father rushes to outrun the clock, scouring thousands of acres, only to realize she’s been taken by an adversary with ties to his past life, one full of secrets. It is hard to believe that Sleeping Bear is Connor Sullivan’s first book. He has mastered all the elements of a thriller. It is dark, engrossing, suspenseful, plot-driven, a true page turner.
EAT. SLEEP. READ.
DREAM ABOUT MONTANA!
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