‘Moon Over Manifest’

Today’s Flyover People column as seen in The Emporia Gazette:

‘MOON OVER MANIFEST’

It’s always fun to stumble upon a novel set in Kansas, and recently I found a story that takes place in Crawford County. This book sends the reader back to the time of prohibition and bootlegging, the 1918 flu epidemic, and underground coal mining in southeast Kansas.

“Moon Over Manifest” is by Clare Vanderpool of Wichita. The book is written and marketed as a YA (young adult) novel. Even though I’m a not-so-young adult, I loved the story.

The imaginary town of Manifest is fashioned after Frontenac. Vanderpool’s grandparents had lived in the area and that’s where she went to create a story. In telling that story, the author ties together two different time periods in the town’s life: 1917-18 and 1936.

When the book begins, it’s 1936, and 12-year-old Abilene is riding a train toward an uncertain future. Her father, Gideon, sent her away for the summer to live with Pastor Howard, an old friend of his.

Abilene’s father’s behavior has confused her and she is not positive he’ll return for her. But she’s not planning to stay in Manifest after the summer ends.

Riding the train, Abilene imagines the town that she has heard her father describe in many stories. On Page 1, as the book’s narrator, Abilene says, “His words drew pictures of brightly painted storefronts and bustling townsfolk. Hearing Gideon tell about it was like sucking on butterscotch. Smooth and sweet.”

Abilene bails out of the train before she gets to Manifest, because “… as anyone worth his salt knows, it’s best to get a look at a place before it gets a look at you.”

Her father has entrusted Pastor Shady Howard to care for her. As Abilene looks over his residence, she thinks, “It was like a jigsaw puzzle I had to piece together myself. Shady’s place appeared to be one part saloon, one part carpenter’s shop, and – could it be? – one part church.”

Shady Howard has been the interim preacher for years ever since the Baptist Church burned down and the real minister left town.

Manifest was different from what she had heard in Gideon’s stories. The town was dry and dusty and didn’t appear to be the colorful, lively place her father had described. Many businesses that he had told her about had been boarded up.

In her room, Abilene finds a hidden cigar box with letters from a young man, Ned, to someone named Jinx. The letters were written in 1918 after Ned had joined the Army.

Not planning to stay long, Abilene doesn’t intend to make friends and wants to spend time searching for hints about her father’s past. But she ends up sharing the letters with two other girls.

In the first letter from Ned to Jinx, Abilene learns about the possibility of a war spy in town, someone Ned calls the Rattler. That letter leads her and her new-found friends to begin a search for this alleged spy.

Now, for me, because I grew up in a small town and because my friend, Amy, and I craved a mystery of our own to solve, I loved this aspect of the book – that these girls had something to actually search for, a spy in town.

They spy mystery interests Abilene, but most of all she wants to learn about her father. She looks for his footprints, signs that he had been there, and she is disappointed to find little that points to his prior existence in Manifest.

Abilene spends time with a neighbor, Miss Sadie, a local medium, who shares stories about the past. And Abilene also gathers information from old issues of the town’s newspaper, but finds no mention of her father.

The book weaves in features of local history: coal mining, the mix of immigrants in the area, orphan trains, a scene with the Ku Klux Klan, World War I, and the 1918 flu epidemic.

The story is a good one, well-told and well-written, with some fine imagery and a bit of humor. The novel may be intended for young readers, but I think many adults will enjoy this book as well.

“Moon Over Manifest” is published by Delacorte Press and is a Junior Library Guild Selection. It is available at the Emporia Public Library and Town Crier Bookstore.

Copyright 2010 ~ Cheryl Unruh