Book Description

As described by reviewer/biographer Larry Bailey (The Wildwood Independent), "Montana Midnight is a brightly glowing literary Aurora Borealis. Plot, dialog, characters, intrigue, small-town politics, emotions, images, places and events twinkle and shimmer across 355 entertaining and richly rewarding pages."Author David Emil Henderson ("Escape ") describes it as a novel of adventure and environmental conflicts in Jackpine, Montana, circa 1974, "when everything changed -- even Montana."Against a background of national turmoil, a young Vietnam veteran returns home to Montana, only to encounter new battles when the Jackpine City Council appoints Nathan Chambers as mayor. The town is suffering economic doldrums, Nathan's beautiful wife Valerie is expecting their first child, and his best friend is urging Nathan to support a militant environmental attack against corporate kingpins who have chosen the quiet Jackpine environs as "a super playground for the rich.""My idea of a literary novel may not be the same as critics and others," Henderson says. "But this is one of those character-driven tales that doesn't fall into the common genres. I call it 'Montana Midnight' because it suggests that at any prior time in its history, this state hadn't quite made it to the next day. It's like all the hands on all the clocks were raised straight up in surrender to the status quo... until powerful factions came to make war, not love. "The pressure for change forces the entire community to assess where it wants to go. And for a young man involved in politics for the first time, it's a dangerous situation. "And it's lessons are meaningful for today," he adds with stern conviction. Henderson based this story on his former experiences as a newspaper publisher in the nation's fourth largest state.