ABOUT THE BOOK
Pumpkin Hill is set in rural western New York near the church where I served from 1975-1981. Pumpkin Hill is a small rise on Rt. 237 near the Bergen Swamp.
Six people's lives are changed forever by the startling events that occur at this crossroads. Harry Backman is a mentally ill young man whose voices draw him to what he hopes will be an apocalyptic moment on Pumpkin Hill. Leonard Grace is an elderly gentleman in a loveless marriage on his evening walk to the Hill. Laura Hall is a writer and the wife of a Presbyterian minister whose automobile accident forms the heart of the story.
Warren, Laura's husband, is a young minister searching for the truth while struggling with whether his wife will live or die. Eloise, Harry's longsuffering mother, fears the worst about her son's involvement in the accident. Bertha, Leonard's crusty wife, struggles with what is real as she comes to grips with years of loss and now her husband's fate.
Pumpkin Hill is a story about going forward even when there is no clear path to follow; it is about tenacious hope in the face of desperate truth; and ultimately it is about the everlasting power of human connection.
