Storytellers at the Columbia River

"A compelling cast... An intriguing novel about a little-known episode in American history... Includes some wonderfully evocative writing about how globally significant events can affect the lives of everyday people."
Steve Olson, author of The Apocalypse Factory: Plutonium and the Making of the Atomic Age

When newcomers arrive with urgent messages, the annual Hanford-White Bluffs Settlers' Reunion on the mid-Columbia River turns out to be more exciting than usual. The reunions are a time of nostalgic reminiscing for the families who were evicted to make way for the Hanford Atomic Plant in 1943. Now much will disrupt the agenda.

The settlers take their usual bus tour to view the ruins of their old town and farms in the closed area around the ghostly defunct Plant. But on the bus this time is a veteran wounded in Middle East wars who is shocked to view the remains of his family's holdings in what had been acres of fruit trees. Two anthropologists expecting peaceful research take notes on the vet's anger and revelations from a woman whose own family suffered the bombing of Nagasaki. And now the news of the Plant's stored radioactive waste seeping to the river adds to the debates on evictions and nuclear bombs.

The tour bus driver, a young Wanapum Indian from upriver, is frustrated over his role in managing the shrinking salmon runs and worries about his children's future. When he finds his grandfather helping the vet in the Plant's forbidden area, he joins in the growing protests. More arrive to jump in the crosscurrents: furious anti-government ranchers, a band of college students, and a Siberian shaman intent on blessing the endangered river. An unlikely romance that blossoms adds another layer of surprise. Some ghosts are laid to rest, while others yet wander, unpacified. Upstaged are the reunion's stories of childhood on the Columbia.

What will be the outcome for this odd collection of protestors and healers? Will they be hauled off to jail? Find new ways to live? Will they take more dramatic action to make their voices heard?