Twisted Tree, by Kent Meyers, 2009) $24. Kent Meyers’ fine novel is about a girl named Hayley Jo whose world is revealed through the eyes of others in a series of short stories.
Opening with “Chosen,” Meyers introduces a man who preys upon young girls. Anas, he calls them. “He finds them everywhere . . . but his Missoula Ana was the best. . . .”
Now he is looking for another, and discovers her in a shop girl in the Rushmore Mall. He asks if there is somewhere nearby to go . . . for the scenery. She suggests a park. “She’ll be off work soon and can show him.”
In “A Real Nice Girl,” Hayley watches an aging man who spends his days in a wheelchair, staring out the living room window and, from there, the story of his earlier years unfolds.
“Prize Money” is set in a department store where “buyers flaunt their cheapness, demanding deals or else they’re hushed and furtive, pretending they can’t be seen.”
“Traces” moves outdoors, where hunters go for big game, and focuses on one man.
Written with understanding, not only of place but also of the people who live there, “Twisted Tree” is a first-rate collection of stories not easily forgotten.
Mountain Made, by Max Brand, $25.95.
The late Max Brand, the best-known pen name of Frederick Faust, not only created such fictional characters as Dr. Kildare and Destry, but his work was the basis for 80 motion pictures as well as radio and television programs.
“Mountain Made” (reissue), an example of Brand at his best, is set around the trials and tribulations of one Winsor Glanvil as he courts an heiress to a fortune who agrees to marry him. But their marriage is opposed by big Jack Rutledge, a jealous rival and formidable foe.
To be on the safe side, they decide to hold the ceremony in a sequestered valley. Unfortunately, Rutledge learns of the plan, arrives ahead of the two, seizes Glanvil and the plot predictably continues to thicken. But, in true Brand style, the ending has an intriguing twist.
Though the author, who served as a war correspondent in Italy, was killed during a night attack on a hilltop village held by the German army during World War II, “Mountain Made” and other collections of his stories, some previously unpublished, live on, as they should.
Sybil Downing is a Boulder novelist who writes regularly about new regional fiction.
