Tim Returns to Minnesota!

Hi again from Tim! In my mind, I'm back in Minnesota. Maybe you saw my Gone to Minnesota in My Mind blog last month, where I told the odd truth that I've barely been to Minnesota, and yet I've loved several novels placed in our neighboring state. Every one of those authors have also done Boswell events. Now it’s time to add one more. I just finished The Land, by Thomas Maltman, and enjoyed every minute! It's mysterious, and dangerous, with hints of the supernatural, and the voice of young Lucien Swenson in early manhood is thoroughly likable. Maltman is doing a Boswell Zoom event on Thursday, October 22nd at 7 pm CDT, in conversation with William Kent Krueger, the author of two books from my original Minnesota blog. Click right here to register now - I can't wait!

The Land is a fine coming of age story, told in convincing style by Lucien, a young man in the throes of forbidden love as he recovers from a terrible accident. But where is Maura? The young mother he fell for while they both worked at a bank is gone, and money from the bank is missing too. Now Lucien has taken a position as caretaker for a large estate in the Minnesota wilderness while the owners are away, near a shadowy church congregation where Maura’s violent husband preaches dark messages about the end of the world. Lucien is determined to find out about this church and the secluded place they call The Land. He needs to find out why Maura disappeared. It’s a well built mystery, with unexpected guests and elements of horror. Lucien’s migraines and other effects of his injuries have him seeing signs in the raw winter and questioning what’s real, giving the novel an eerie feel and a spiritual search for revelation. I enjoyed every bit of this story and its conflicted cast of characters. An exceptional novel!

If you read my first Minnesota blog, you may have seen the way I teased an entire state with my tongue-in-cheek take on James Taylor’s Carolina in My Mind. I took a little heat about that from a Minnesota friend, and I used it to do an update. Here’s the new version. Enjoy the beautiful Midwest fall!

In my mind I’m gone to Minnesota.
Can’t you feel the snowfall?
Just leave your boots out in the hall.
Car gets stuck, and then it stalls.
Ya get hit from behind.
Yes I’m gone to Minnesota in my mind.

Heard some stuff from a Facebook friend who lives there.
When my verse reduced her home to misery in snow.
It’s not a bad place, she said.
For a bit I hung my head.
But held on to a longing for 
this place I’ve never known.
I’m still gone to Minnesota in my mind. 
  
                                     - Sweet Baby Tim