T. H. Platt is one of the most knowledgeable people about the catastrophe wrought in rural regions all over the world. Everyone in the fight knows her. She put in time as director of The National Center for Public Policy Research’s Environment and Enterprise Institute and her family were fishers on the West Coast. She knows where every body is buried, in that hackneyed phrase, and she has written a novel which painlessly describes what has been going on.
August used to be a time to read novels, but now, our sociopathic overlords have made the summer doldrums into pain and chaos. The Dark Side of Hunger Mountain is both an escape into a parallel world, and confers knowledge you will find nowhere else. You will come out of it fully enlightened about one of the battlefields of the modern era.
Your Face Belongs to U...
Best Price: $5.47
Buy New $19.40
(as of 06:16 UTC - Details)
I highly recommend it. It is compelling, deeply dramatic, and reminiscent of novels when they meant something. Here is the first chapter. The rest are on her Substack, linked below.
CHAPTER 1: Wildfire!
On the mountain, the wind changed direction and the man turned to face it. It was warm, menacing, carrying the familiar acrid scent of flame consuming forest.
The man climbed into his truck and threaded his way up the steep hairpin curves, slick with water coursing across gravel. He downshifted hard and the gun rack shivered behind his head, the toolbox rattled in the flatbed. Every bolt holding metal clattered and creaked in protest, and he savored the familiar rush of adrenaline. The oversized tires on his 4×4 held and the rutted logging road disappeared below.
On the peak, he stopped in a spray of gravel and mud and unfolded himself from the cab. Here the Olympic’s icy breath bit his ears and nose and he turned up the collar on his thick sheepskin coat. A sickly sun hovered eerily, shrouded in smoke, barely illuminating the waves of gray and green timberlands rolling to the horizon.
Jackson Armstrong knew every mist- and smoke-shrouded slope and valley beneath him. He knew every settlement, every campground, even the illegal ones hidden behind rocky ridge lines rising to wicked peaks of wind and snow.
He pulled off his right leather glove and fine-tuned his binoculars. Two ridge lines over, fire took its share of beetle-infested blow down. The beast gorged on fuel, making its way up evergreens which whipped wildly in protest before being lost in plumes of flame.
Fed land, he thought, studying areas where gray smoke swirled through white. There, he knew, the fire crew was making progress.
Jackson felt the northern wind quicken and turn and he studied a new glow. It coiled, billowing black smoke as it picked up speed, determined to join its mate on the far side of Hunger Mountain.
He flipped on his radio. “Captain 12, Armstrong Tac 2,” he said. A beat. Static.
“Captain 12,” crackled the voice of Tim Miller.
“Tim, there’s a new burn crossing below you,” said Jackson. “Heading up the flats to the north side of Hunger Mountain.”
“Another? What the—” said Tim as he studied the sky in his yellow and green Nomex top and pants. “How long we got?”
“Fifteen,” said Jackson. “Maybe less. Can you make the ridge?”
“We’re on it. Out,” said Tim, turning to direct his crew. “Up the mountain! Go! Go! Go!” To his radio, he said, “Command, Captain 12. Requesting water drop. North ridge, Hunger Mountain. Over.”
A short beat and a voice confirmed, “Captain 12, Command. Copy that. Water drop. North ridge, Hunger—” Static.
Tim moved up behind his crew, choosing his footing carefully, past the tree line and water trickling over rock from a fissure above.
One young man lost his footing and another’s hand grabbed his. “Gotcha,” said David Lopez pulling Chris Franklin up. They joined the rest of the crew who tried to ignore the flames wicking up behind them as they furiously hacked at anything that might provide fuel—at that elevation, there wasn’t much; it was mostly bare mineral soil and boulders left behind by glaciers that retreated long ago.
“Forty-foot cut, breadbox pattern on me!” yelled Tim, gesturing where he wanted shelters laid. Flames licked their way up the slope, belching smoke and the temperature rose as the crew carved out body-sized depressions in the ground. Like digging a grave, thought Tim as he spit out soot. “Deploy!” he yelled.
The crew tossed their equipment aside and pulled silver-colored bricks from their packs. Embers swirled around them as they tore red pull rings and removed the clear plastic covers. Holding LEFT and RIGHT tabs, they shook out the “shake and bakes,” letting them billow and capture as much air inside as possible.
Each crew member stepped on one end of their shelter, slid their arms into the hold-down straps, wrapped themselves in the material, and—while folding the edges of the foil under their bodies—dropped and rolled into the depressions they’d carved out on the ground.
At the end of the tightly packed line, Tim yelled, “Sound off!” as he enfolded himself in his own foil shelter.
Indoctrinated Brain: H...
Best Price: $11.62
Buy New $10.25
(as of 08:06 UTC - Details)
“Franklin, inside!” said Chris into his radio. This was followed by brothers David and Carlos Lopez, Anders Hansen, and Erica White. “Captain Tim Miller, inside!” completed the roster.
“I love you guys,” whispered Erica into her radio.
“You know it!” said Anders.
“We’ll make it,” said David. “Terrain’s on our side.”
“If I don’t, tell Momma and Beth I love ’em,” said Chris.
“We’ll be fine,” said Anders. “The fire won’t park, but it’ll get hotter ’n hell.”
“Nuff talkin’, save your air,” said Tim. “Belly to the ground, nose in the dirt!”
The crew went silent, positioning their gloved hands around their faces, focusing on slowing their breathing and heart rates.
