Description
It is the summer of 1968, but for Marion Goodman, a 62-year-old widow from Wisconsin, life on her Summit Road farm is miles away from the strife of the nation, until one evening when she aims her rifle at what she thinks is a coyote and instead discovers a runaway teenage girl foraging in her garden. Despite an inner voice warning her not to, Marion acts on her impulse to be generous to those in need. In doing so, she unwittingly solders the link of a chain that will bring others to her door—a girl fleeing abusive foster parents, a draft dodger with a growing list of crimes, and a young man truly without a home. When the three converge at summer’s end, Marion’s once-safe haven is threatened by a sociopath’s violence and revenge.
Advance Praise for Summit Road
“I love a story about strangers finding each other at just the right time, and Summit Road really delivers. Dawn Hogue’s meticulous portraits of characters reeling from loss and loneliness coupled with a carefully unfurling plot make for a super satisfying story about courage, home, chosen family, and the alchemy of unexpected connections.” — Miciah Bay Gault, author of Goodnight Stranger (Park Row Books)
“Dawn Hogue has created characters who will not soon leave you. Summit Road captures the true definition of family and what is possible when people remain open to love even when they’ve been bruised and battered by life.” — Dana Huff, author of A Question of Honor
Lois Baer Barr (verified owner) –
It was the sixties, and the world was going up in smoke: bras, draft cards, Vietnamese villages, urban neighborhoods around the country. Sexual revolution, Women’s Liberation, flower children, demonstrations at the Pentagon, marches on Washington, illegal drugs, and teen runaways. Everything was changing fast; yet at Marion Goodman’s farm on Summit Road in rural Wisconsin, tranquility reigned.
A retired schoolteacher, Marion chose to grieve for her husband in the solitude of her garden and her hens. Her only visitors were her old friend Roger, the town sheriff, and customers who bought her eggs. All that changed one night when a young runaway named Bridget tried to steal food from her garden.
Dawn Hogue’s characters have fled home to dodge the draft or because of abusive families or foster families. She switches seamlessly from city to city, from runaway to runaway, and back and forth in time. Artfully, she moves her story and her reader along. The author always brings us back to Summit Road where Marion’s first hesitating act of kindness with young Bridget reaps surprising, frightening and inspiring results. Summit Road deepens our insight into the contentious divisions of our country in the sixties and reminds us that our actions and choices form and follow us.
Lois Baer Barr
Author of Lope de Vega’s Daughter and Biopoesis