The Civil Wars of Jonah Moran [Paperback]

Marjorie Reynolds (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 10, 2001

Jessica Moran must return to the Northwestern logging town she calls home, when her brother Jonah, the local misfit, is accused of setting a deadly fire. Now, she must face not only her brother's uncertain future, but the deepest secrets of her own past...

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The smoky scent of the past lingers in this confident second novel, set on Washington's Olympic Peninsula and infused with the deep-forest spirit of the Pacific Northwest. Returning to the logging town of Misp after her failed marriage, 30ish Jessica Moran, the daughter of a mill owner, starts a window-cleaning company and devotes herself to her brother Jonah, a gentle misfit afflicted with Asperger's syndrome (an disease like autism) and obsessed with the Civil War. If it weren't for Jonah, Jessica might never communicate with her formidable mother, Lila, who is now head of the family business, since she is convinced that Lila was responsible for Jessica's father's death by drowning nearly 20 years before. Only after a fire consumes Misp's new halfway house for Seattle convicts, leaving evidence of Jonah's presence at the scene, is the smoldering legacy of that long-ago summer fully reawakened. The investigator for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms is none other than Quinault Indian lawyer Callum Luke, Jessica's childhood sweetheart, and as Jessica and Callum look for the cause of the fire, they revisit the fraught period after Jessica's father's death and the sudden ending of their relationship. Their fears, the town's bigotry, the truths they did not wish to face are all aired as the current crime is solved. Reynolds (The Starlite Drive-in) once again proves herself a sure-handed storyteller, alternating Jessica's coming-of-age memories with the criminal investigation and unraveling the Moran family's painful history in deft measures. But her prose really soars when she describes the timberlandAa tent in the woods, the bottom of an overgrown lake, a drive over remote roads during a stormAcapturing the almost magical spiritual connection between people and the land. Agent, Angela Rinaldi. Regional author tour. (Nov.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

A small logging town on Washington State's Olympic Peninsula is the setting for Reynolds's (The Starlite Drive-in) second novel. At 35, when she returns to her hometown to live, Jessica Moran carries a lot of emotional baggage from events that occurred almost two decades before. She still blames her domineering mother for the overly harsh treatment of Jonah, her younger brother, which led to her father's drowning death. Worst of all, when 16-year-old Jessica became pregnant by Callum Luke, a high school classmate and Quinault Indian who lived on the reservation abutting her family's lumber mill, her mother sent Jessica to relatives in California and insisted that she give the baby up for adoption. Shortly after Jessica moves back home, a fire breaks out in a halfway house for ex-cons, killing three of the four residents, and Callum, now working for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, is brought in to investigate the fire. Although all the evidence points to Jonah, always regarded a misfit, Jessica refuses to believe her brother's guilt. Still remorseful that she never told Callum about their child, Jessica is forced to cooperate with him in order to clear her brother and discover the real perpetrator of the crime. Pleasant if predictable; for larger collections.ANancy Pearl, Washington Ctr. for the Book, Seattle
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Berkley Trade (April 10, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 042517834X
• ISBN-13: 978-0425178348
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,932,347 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Marjorie Reynolds is an award-winning author, speaker, writing teacher and former movie-advertising executive.

She most recently published in the anthology, THE PEN AND THE KEY. William Morrow & Co. published her novels, THE STARLITE DRIVE-IN and THE CIVIL WARS OF JONAH MORAN in hardcover, and Berkley released them in paperback. The American Library Association chose THE STARLITE DRIVE-IN as one of the Ten Best Books of the Year for Young Adults. It also received a Barnes & Noble "Discover Great New Writers" award, and it was optioned for film. It was a Literary Guild alternate selection and a Reader's Digest Select Editions book. Rights were sold to seven countries.

Her novels have received praise in numerous newspapers and publications. She has been a speaker and conference presenter for the Pacific Northwest Writers Association, the Oregon Writers Colony, Willamette (OR) Writers Conference, the South Carolina Writers Workshop, The Pacifc Northwest Booksellers Association Trade Show, The Los Angeles Book Fair, The South Carolina Book Festival, the Edmonds (WA) Write on the Sound Writers' Conference, Seattle Writers Association, Seattle Free Lances, and at other literary arts events. Radio stations in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, and Bloomington, IN, and numerous newspapers throughout the country have interviewed and featured her. She taught advanced popular fiction at the University of Washington Education Outreach program in Seattle.

Before starting her fiction-writing career at the age of 47, Marjorie was Cineplex Odeon's regional advertising director for the Pacific Northwest. She worked for approximately 15 years in the movie advertising business, dealing directly with Hollywood studios. Before that career, she worked as a newspaper reporter in Indiana, Iowa, California, and Washington.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars From the powerful prologue I was hooked, November 8, 1999

By 

Michael Shoemaker (Seattle, Washington) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Civil Wars of Jonah Moran: A Novel (Hardcover)

In her wonderful second book, Marjorie Reynolds creates an intriguing story set in the logging town of Misp in Washington's Olympic Peninsula. From the gripping prologue, Ms.Reynolds carries the reader through Jessica Moran's profound search for truth that combines deep family angst with cultural bitterness and small town prejudices. I was hooked from the very beginning and read her book straight through. Jessica's journey for truth set against the backdrop of a vanishing part of Pacific Northwest life fascinated me.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Several themes covered in a tightly written novel, October 27, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Civil Wars of Jonah Moran: A Novel (Hardcover)

Marjorie Reynolds once again delivers with strong themes and interesting characters. She is not afraid to address a cross-cultural romance and mental disablement. Her settings come off the page--I forgot I was on my own porch several times as I read her descriptions of the Olympic peninsula. An absorbing read by a writer who delivers what she promises.

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A SPLENDID SECOND NOVEL BY A GIFTED WRITER, February 10, 2000

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Civil Wars of Jonah Moran: A Novel (Hardcover)

This excellent novel was intriguing from the beginning to the end. Complex family relationships between mother and daughter, daughter and father, sister and brother unfold as the primary theme, the possiblility of gross injustice, is explored. Reynolds has created a cast of believable characters who grow in self-knowledge as the events in the novel affect their lives. Jonah, a young man diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, a mild form of autism, is especially well-developed without traces of sentimentality. The author also very capably writes an inter-cultural romantic relationship with honesty and respect for the similarities and the differences of the couple. Readers who enjoy vivid descriptions, a bit of mystery, well-written dialogue, and writing that is sensitive in it's development of characters will appreciate and enjoy this fine second novel.