Peevish Pen: Downsizing: A Mountain Home Novel

Lin Stepp's latest Smoky Mountain novel, Downsizing, will be officially released on April 1, 2020, but is available now for pre-order from Amazon. I received my advance reader copy this week and spent a day and part of a night reading it—it's a compelling story, and I couldn't put it down until I finished.

Orville: "I'm glad you put it down. I want to rest on it."

Downsizing has several qualities I enjoy in a novel—a strong sense of place, a connection to the land, an appreciation of nature, family connections, interesting characters who are able to overcome their problems, inspirational passages, and a happy ending.

One of the things I like about Lin Stepp's novels is her inclusion of a map. It's helpful to see who lives where in this region of the Smoky Mountains, how they get from one place to another, and what trails they like to hike.

Another thing I particularly liked about Downsizing is that the main character is middle-aged. Mary Pat Latham, a 54-year-old mother of four grown children and wife of a cardiologist, lives in a big colonial home in a fashionable section of Knoxville and has an active social life. She appears to have it all— until her husband Russell unexpectedly comes home at lunchtime one day and announces he's getting a divorce, and he's already arranged for their home to soon be sold but he'll provide for her. They've grown apart, he tells her, plus she's gotten fat. Stunned, she escapes to her parents' former cottage near Gatlinburg which she and her family have used as a vacation getaway through the years.

In the small house where she grew up, Mary Pat finds herself—but it takes a while. Her childhood sweetheart Owen, retired from a military career, lives not far away, and he is the one who finds her crying her first day there. Former friends and neighbors soon welcome her back. After she's moved out of her Knoxville home, she explores the community and reconnects with her two best friends from high school. Though not yet sure what she'll do or where she'll go, Mary Pat decides to stay for a while until she can make some decisions.

One decision she makes is to lose weight. After she overhears some teenage girls making fun of her fatness after she'd eaten a burger and piece of pie in a diner, she leaves in tears. On the way home, she sees a weight control center and stops in. She decides to take control of her weight. She also starts taking control of her life.

Orville:"Reading that part about food made me hungry."

I won't give away any more of the plot, but adventures abound in Downsizing: a wild bear in the kitchen, several weddings and one funeral, plus a couple of surprises—particularly where love is concerned.

Orville: "I worked so hard reading this book that I'm ready for a cat-nap."

With themes of coping with change, starting over, finding yourself, and opening yourself for new opportunities, Downsizing would be a good choice for a book club. Stepp handily includes a book club guide with discussion questions. On her website, she also includes a pdf. of the weight-loss book that Mary Pat used.

More info about Downsizing is available on this page of Lin Stepp's website: https://linstepp.com/2020/12/31/downsizing-a-mountain-home-book/