cover image The King of Vermont: A Novel for Fans of Country Journal and Prairie Home Companion

The King of Vermont: A Novel for Fans of Country Journal and Prairie Home Companion

Stephen Morris. William Morrow & Company, $16.95 (228pp) ISBN 978-0-688-08428-8

Midlife crises prompt strange, unpredictable behavior in the denizens of a rural Vermont town in Morris's second comic novel. Ophthalmologist Darwin Hunter, who decides to run for the Vermont state senate on a campaign promise of ``total disclosure,'' reveals to voters the most intimate details of his personal life; his wife Sammi, declaring her need for a ``multigamous relationship,'' moves out and hooks up with a 65 basketball star; ex-radical hippie Townshend Clarke transforms himself into an architectural maven and hatches a scheme to restore Upper Granville, Vt., to its pristine 1839 state. Set in the same fictive hamlet as Morris's Beyond Yonder , this gently sardonic satire, like its predecessor, pits ``Chucks,'' the native Vermonters, against ``Flatlanders,'' the invading urban refugees for whom home canning is a sacrament. Morris has mildly amusing fun with a large cast of deft caricatures as he spoofs New Englanders, back-to-nature types, political elections, yuppies and the lofty standards of private behavior demanded of politicians. (July)