Charles Frazier had been teaching University-level literature part-time when he first became spellbound by the story of his great-great uncle W. P. Inman. Inman was a confederate soldier during the Civil War who took a harrowing foot-journey from the ravaged battle fields back to his home in the mountains of North Carolina. The specifics of Inman's history were sketchy, indeed, but Frazier's father spun his tale with such enticing drama that Frazier began filling in the gaps, himself. Bits of the life of Frazier's grandfather, who also fought in the Civil War, helped flesh out the journey of William Pinkney Inman. He also looked toward the legendary epic poem
The Odyssey for inspiration. Slowly, a gripping tale of devotion, faith, redemption, and love coalesced in Frazier's mind. For six or seven years, he toiled away on the story that would ultimately become
Cold Mountain, and with the novel's publication in 1997, the first-time author had a modern classic of American literature on his hands.
In Cold Mountain, Inman is a wounded confederate soldier who abandons the war to venture home to his beloved Ada. Along the way, he is confronted by various obstacles, but he journeys on valiantly, regardless. Frazier cleverly divides the narrative between Inman's trek and Ada's story as she struggles to make due in the wake of her father's death and the absence of her love.
When Frazier was only half finished with the book, he passed it along to friend and novelist Kaye Gibbons (Ellen Foster; A Virtuous Woman), who then got it into the hands of her agent. Much to his disbelief, Frazier's novel went on to become the smash sensation of the late-`90s. Winning countless laudatory reviews from publications throughout the nation, Cold Mountain also became a must-read commercial smash. The novel ultimately won the coveted National Book Award for fiction and was adapted into an Oscar-winning motion picture starring Jude Law, Nicole Kidman and best supporting actress Renee Zellweger.
Now, nearly ten years after the publication of Cold Mountain, Frazier is finally back with Thirteen Moons. While Thirteen Moons returns to a 19th century setting, 12-year old Will is quite a different protagonist from Inman. With only a horse, a key, and a map, the boy is prodded into Indian country with the mission of running a trading post. In this dangerous environment, Will learns to empathize with the Cherokees, who open his mind to a much broader world than he had ever seen before. With the same lyrical fluidity and sense of wonder that brought Cold Mountain to life, Frazier fashions Thirteen Moons in similarly epic fashion. Once again, the critics are coming out to applaud Frazier's work, Kirkus reviews declaring Thirteen Moons "a great gift to all of us, from one of our very best writers."
Although Will is not directly based on a distant relative, as Inman had been, the story is equally close to the author's heart. "Growing up, I lived in a green valley surrounded by tall blue mountains," Frazier explains in an essay he wrote for Random House, Inc. "Not much more than a century earlier, the valley had been filled with Cherokee people, living on farms and in villages all up and down the river... In part, Thirteen Moons is my attempt to understand how I came to live where I did, not as history or myth, but as narrative."
