Harsh truths glare out, especially for the book s hero, Ben Givens. Ben is recently widowed, after a happy 50-year marriage, and has just retired. But he crashes his car in the rain in the mountains, thereby spurring a series of adventures that form the crux of the book. But none of these people can give him solace, and Guterson drives this point home stylistically. East of the Mountains is not a lyrical book like Snow.
Description is unflinching, palpable.
And when Ben encounters a comely farm girl, we behold an old man s impotence. It calls to mind Guterson s life amid Bainbridge s cedars and the ramshackle bungalow that he, for the moment, still lives in. The four-bedroom is 75 years old, and weary, and Guterson and his wife, Robin, a homemaker, have been here for 14 years. They moved in shortly after the birth of their first child, when Bainbridge was a funky, hippie-ish refuge of 8,000 people. Sundays and Mondays are Guterson s dish nights.