God's Kingdom
Page 19
—Jim Lynch, author of The Highest Tide and Truth Like the Sun
“God’s Kingdom is a pleasure and a surprise. It has everything one would expect from a Howard Mosher novel and a lot more, too. It is fun to read, and is filled with adventures, beguiling characters, the presence of the natural world and its beauties; but it is also compelling evidence that Howard Mosher has really just begun. This, I think, is his best book, but that is only because it is his most recent. If you have not read Mosher, the loss is yours. If you have, more pleasure is on the way.”
—Craig Nova, author of The Good Son
“In God’s Kingdom Mosher brings us the coming of age of a young writer; along the way we see the kingdom as Jimmy sees it, its harshness, as well as its glory, and through the good, the bad, and the ugly is the triumph of the human spirit and the benediction of the landscape upon that spirit. God’s Kingdom is one of those fictions that leave the reader uplifted without sacrificing truth, realism, or style.”
—Ernest Hebert, author of the Darby Chronicles
“In God’s Kingdom, Howard Frank Mosher again displays the qualities that make him the nonpareil chronicler of a vanishing upcountry New England. The author’s deep knowledge of, and affection for, his landscape and its denizens resonates in every sentence of this bright new novel. Mosher’s work is regional, yes, but only in the sense that Robert Frost’s was: his deep contemplation of local matters provides a lens through which he and his lucky reader can more keenly know what it is to be human.”
—Sydney Lea, Poet Laureate of Vermont and author of A North Country Life
“Howard Frank Mosher’s stunning new novel, God’s Kingdom, begins as a coming-of-age story, and ends up an epic work of genius. Not since Hemingway’s Nick Adams has there been a character so expertly and lovingly written as Jim Kinneson. For decades in his indispensable novels, Howard Frank Mosher has refracted Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom into historical precincts of stark reality, composed hardscrabble human music, drawn landscapes seemingly seanced up from before the Age of Reason, and played out Fate like slowly building storms in his character’s hearts. He is the rarest thing in literature: an original. Vermont is Mr. Mosher’s literary kingdom and he rules it with a bittersweet pen pressed hard to the page.”
—Howard Norman, author of Next Life Might Be Kinder
“Few writers plumb the cords that link fathers and sons with the hope—and humor—of Howard Frank Mosher. He is wistful and wise, and his moral compass is as precise as his immense skills as a storyteller. I cherish my visits to the mythical Kingdom County that once upon a time was Vermont.”
—Chris Bohjalian, author of The Sandcastle Girls and Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
1. Blooded
2. White Knights
3. The Ballad of Gaëtan Dubois
4. Haunted
5. Rivals
6. Only in the Kingdom
7. False Spring
8. Territory but Little Known
9. The Scout
10. Memorial Day
11. Senior Year
12. God’s Kingdom
Genealogy Chart
About the Author
Also by Howard Frank Mosher
Advance Praise for God’s Kingdom
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
GOD’S KINGDOM. Copyright © 2015 by Howard Frank Mosher. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.stmartins.com
Chapter 2, “White Knights” was originally published in Hunger Mountain Review, in 2013, in a somewhat different format.
Cover designed by Young Lim
Cover photographs: mountains by Chris Archinet / Getty Images; men by Robin Skoldborg / Getty Images
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The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-06948-1 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4668-8200-3 (e-book)
eISBN 9781466882003
First Edition: October 2015