North of Nelson, Volume I
....six gripping short stories set in the wilderness of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan will hold the reader spellbound as the various protagonists live, and sometimes perish, in this often harsh and rugged land. The mythical village of Nelson frames the life and plights of the various actors as they plunge headlong physically, psychologically, and metaphorically, into the treacherous waters of the Sturgeon River Country, where humans live precariously on the edge of a knife, and every mistake could be fatal.
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While this work is entirely fiction—it easily spans over a century—the tales dig at, and lay bare, a slice of Americana, a neglected culture, which is rapidly atrophying in rural areas—not only across the Upper Peninsula, but in much of the rural north.
In the opening story, The Irascible Pedagogue, set in the later part of the nineteenth century, the lonely and maddened heart of the village pedagogue, Horace Nelson, ends regrettably as jealously invades his troubled mind causing unpredictable mayhem and murder. In the second and award-winning short story, The Silent Mistress, Lizzie must endure, not only the poverty and destitution of the Great Depression, but also the inexorable decline of her husband's life as he wastes away from the ravages of alcoholism.
Other memorable stories in North of Nelson, Volume 1, will not only entertain, but challenge the reader to examine the guts and sinew of a rare and vanishing culture—the great Upper Peninsula.
Hilton Everett Moore lives in a remote cabin in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
Back cover, abridged
Formats
Stories
- The Irascible Pedagogue
- The Silent Mistress Previously published by Euphemism, Illinois State University, Fall 2020. Awarded Editor's Choice.
- Requiem for Ernie Previously published in the U.P. Reader, Spring 2021.
- A Shotgun Wedding
- A Dog Named Bunny Previously published in the U.P. Reader, Spring 2021.
- Woodsmoke
6 stories Published September 2022 Cover and illustrations by Andreea Chele
Recognition
U.P. Notable Book, top-ten list, UPPAA
What reviewers said
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These six stories reminds me of the early Joyce in Dubliners. Each is a careful analysis of deep and painful emotion generated by crime or illness or simply the remote ruggedness of Upper Michigan. I think a genuine U.P. literature needs this sort of work and am glad to see it.
Dr. Donald M. HasslerProfessor of English, Emeritus, Kent State University; Former Executive, Extrapolation; Advisor, International Authors Publisher