Desolation Mountain

Desolation Mountain (Cork O’Connor, 17) William Kent Krueger. Atria Paperback (ISBN: 9781501147470) 2019.

Summary: When a U.S. senator’s plane crashes, Cork seeks the truth behind the crash and Stephen, a recurring dream.

Stephen kept having the same dream. He’s watching a boy who is and is not him. An eagle appears out of the clouds. The boy draws a bow, looses an arrow and brings down the bird. As the bird falls, an egg drops from it. Then the boy is looking at him. Or rather behind him at what he senses is an enormous, terrifying beast. He awakens as they scream together.

Stephen talks to Henry, the old mide to make sense of the dream. So far, they cannot. But Stephen somehow realizes he fears for Henry.

Then the plane crash occurs near Desolation Mountain. A U.S. Senator and her family, coming to discuss a mining project with the townspeople, die in the crash. Cork, part of a volunteer Search and Rescue team are first on the scene. Stephen joins him. Was the plane the eagle? Stephen is deeply troubled. If he’d understood, could it have been prevented?

All sorts of Federal investigators, including the FBI, show up. The site is cordoned off, and Stephen, studying the scene from the mountain is briefly held by some kind of authority figure. However, he momentarily sees another young man. Locals, including Sheriff Marsha Dross, are pulled off the case. Officially, the cause is given out as “pilot error.” They say there was no flight recorder.

But in that case, what are people looking for at the crash site? Is it the “egg” in Stephen’s dream? Then some tribal members, who were first on the crash site disappear. So Cork starts investigating. He discovers a man he’d worked with before is also in town. Bo Thorson is a former Secret Service Agent. At one point he took a bullet to save the life of the wife of the Vice president. Based on his past experience, Cork is willing to trust him and share info. Stephen and Henry intuit something different. And Thorson does save Cork at one point when Cork is set up for a “hit.” He gave Cork a bullet proof vest that saved his life. But Stephen and Henry are right. Bo is dividing his loyalties, and Cork and his family are “expendables.”

Cork recognizes his family is in danger. He and Stephen and his son-in-law Daniel were also early on the scene. So they shelter with Henry. But they make a mistake. Bo also knows where they are.

The young man in the dream is important. He is a photographer and captured a damning piece of evidence on film, that points to the people and motivations behind the crash. But will Cork close in on the truth before those who endanger him and his family close in on them?

Finally, Stephen does finally summons the courage to look at the beast at his back. But I’ll leave that for the reader to discover.

Bo Thorson is a complicated figure. I think he really wants to return Cork’s trust and sees something in the life of Cork’s family he has missed. Also, Waboo, Jenny’s adopted son also seems to have some special gift. He also sees monsters in the woods. Meanwhile, Stephen, having to fight impulses, is slowly growing into his own calling. What I do wonder is how Krueger will develop Cork further. As time goes on, he is identifying more deeply with his tribal ancestry. What is clear is that Krueger is a master at developing the sense of dark foreboding we encounter in Stephen’s dream and both Henry and Waboo’s sense of evil in the woods. It keeps one turning the pages!