Witches' Mountain by Gerald R Wright.

                          Witches' Mountain by Gerald R. Wright.

"The more he thought about it, the more he knew that Kate and the mountain would draw him back-especially Kate."

Our main character, Rick Jackson was 27 years old, reasonably open-minded, stoic, pragmatic and gregarious., quite a nice chap, in fact. A small, engineering company he had worked for as a salesman had folded but he was fortunate in finding similar work with another small business covering a wide and diverse territory of farms, lumber companies and engineering works.

He loved the open country and mountains in their majestic natural beauty and grandeur. Just as well as his work covered the infamous mountain-Witches' Mountain linked to the Salem trials. The novel begins with Rick driving his Mustang through the mountains, it's twilight. The colours around him were spectacular: yellows, oranges and reds-a sight worth seeing and remembering.

A comfort stop heading to Charlesburgh made him feel "as if he was in the back of beyond and somehow back in the past." Was this moonshine country? Possibly. Whilst having a snack he met a typical hillbilly who advised him to go along the ridge, used by logging companies. Innocent enough but this is where the fun and mystery begins. He has a steep climb with sharp hair pin bends to test his nerve. The mist drifted "like fingers-long, vertical fingers" opening up "like curtains" as he passed through. A nice atmospheric touch.

Rick became "decidedly uncomfortable" after his encounter with a rough-looking trucker displaying a vivid scar on his face at the Black Ridge Motel and Restaurant, a mountain truck stop. He later discovered that the trucker was Joe Kiley and he had left his old Kenworth truck outside in the parking lot. Mack and his wife Jenny owned the hotel. The plot moves slowly when Kiley left behind a camera after speaking to Rick. Our main character wanted to catch him to return it but it didn't quite work out like that.

We discover that Rick wasn't superstitious but once he gleaned of the accident with Kiley's truck where he lost control of his brakes, crashed through the barrier, left the road and rolled over and over down the mountain he wasn't sure. Kiley was thrown through the windshield and his truck caught fire. What is coincidental was that this tragedy had occurred two years ago to the very day that Rick conversed with him or imagined he had! Did he imagine it all or was this paranormal?

When Rick drives along the same route, he discovers a large bundle lying in the middle of the road. He imagined it lying in a pool of blood. A flicker of lights on his left suggested flames and burning, unnerving even for a sceptic. Was this a body of another trucker? A dead body presumably? He couldn't swerve safely and kept going forward waiting for the impact. Surprisingly, the impact didn't happen: "There was no body, no pool of blood and no flames in the wood."

A return journey via Black Ridge, hopefully another comfort stop was perplexing. The tarmac was cracked and broken, the sign rusted, weeds had invaded the place and the roof had caved in. There was no sign of life or activity. He moved on to Spiller Township which reminded him of the cowboy days, an old west frontier town where you'd see plenty of gunfights. Another stop and an encounter with the gossip Mabel, a ghost who had died seven years ago.

At this point he meets the love of his life, Kate, a Southern Belle and very pretty as you'd expect. Her mother had been married to Joe Kiley. Rick felt bewitched by her "as if by an irresistible magnetism. A moth to a flame." Was it Kate or the mystery of the mountain? Her Great Granma was Roberta Elizabeth Lee and she had the "Talent." She could see into the future and acted as a mediator "to stop things blowing up too much" and she predicts a "catastrophe." But who will take over from her?

A second encounter with the old Kenworth truck seeming to be on the wrong side of the road, forced Rick into pulling the wheel over to the right to avoid a collision before realising it was the phantom truck: no truck, no trailer, no sound. Nothing.

During the Salem witch trials it seems that some of those accused took refuge on the mountain and since then there have been battles between forces of good against evil. In the past, fires and pestilence have helped to restore some sense of order.

Rick gets drawn into this paranormal world of Witches' Mountain, full of danger and unpredictable. Can he understand it and survive its force, the powers of darkness? How would he have felt knowing that "something disastrous was imminent?" Armageddon? An excellent read for young adults in particular. Plenty of blood and gore.

Publisher: WordPlay Publishing Ltd.    ISBN: 13: 978-1497518964.

REVIEW it by Carol Naylor.

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