Look to the Mountain

 Cannon, LeGrand. Look to the Mountain. 2016. 496p. ISBN 978-1-58157-365-7. Available at FIC CAN on the library shelves.

Whit and Melissa live in Kettleford, New Hampshire, in the late 1760s. Although settled for many years, Kettleford retains the feel of a frontier town. Whit is the son of a local farmer who prefers the rum bottle to hard work. Melissa is the daughter of the local inn keeper, and one of the few eligible women in the village. Whit has had his eye on Melissa for a long time, but so has Joe the Portugese, a sailor from Europe who bought the smithy when its former proprietor retired.

A contest to see who could hay the most grass for the honor of courting Melissa is organized, and despite Joe's underhanded tactics and physical attack on Whit, the young man manages to hay the most. Desiring a better life for himself and for Melissa, Whit takes off not long after to explore settling possibilities in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. He soon locates a good spot in the new township of Tamworth, builds a lean-to, and after having made friends with residents of Sandwich, the township next to Tamworth, he returns to Kettleford.

Meanwhile, Melissa, who had been left behind, feels Whit's absence more with every passing day. Joe still lurks in the background, and her father decides to marry her to Joe while Whit is gone. Whit returns just in time, and the happy couple is united in marital bliss and leaves the next day to make the trek to their new land.

Populated with remarkable characters, Look to the Mountain nevertheless manages to throw most of its focus on Whit and Melissa's struggle to survive at the base of Mount Chocorua as they pioneer the opening of the Tamworth township. Encompassing part of the early history of New Hampshire and of the nascent United States, the book is short on dialog (as if people were of few words back in those days) but rather filled with description of the environment in which Whit and Melissa live. Slowly over the course of years they manage to tame and conquer their small corner of the world, building a life for them, their children, and their friends.

Fans of historical fiction will appreciate the details that craft an amazing tale first told in 1942 and republished many times since.