Longing for a home in big, wild country that would keep them passionate and young, Jonathan Johnson and his wife, Amy, set out to build a log cabin on his family’s land in a remote and beautiful corner of Idaho. But what began as a doable dream for the two of them suddenly looks quite different when, on their first morning in the cabin—without electricity, a telephone, running water, or real windows—the couple learn that Amy is pregnant.

 

In this lyrical and intimate chronicle of making a home the hard way, Johnson describes the competing joys and anxieties of preparing for fatherhood in a setting as challenging as it is promising: a paradise of mythic snowfalls and warming wood stoves and elk tracks at the front door, but also a place where vision, and even struggle and compromise, are not always enough. Hannah and the Mountain tells a rare and delicate story of two people exploring the unmapped territories of loss and grief and finding solace and grace in the mountains. It offers the reader an unforgettable portrait of a couple growing up, learning nature’s hard and beautiful lessons, and discovering a love of place and each other strong and wild enough to renew them and be carried into the future

Jonathan Johnson is an assistant professor at the Inland Northwest Center for Writers, the graduate writing program at Eastern Washington University. His work has appeared in various literary magazines and in The Best American Poetry. He is the author of Mastodon, 80% Complete, a book of poems.

"A couple seeks life's deeper meaning in a return to the land . . . and faces both hardship and joy. It's a familiar American story these days, but Johnson tells it with compassion and grace, focusing in particular on his wife Amy's pregnancy and their preparations to bring a baby into their wilderness world. . . . Johnson is an elegant, emotive narrator."—Publishers Weekly

"Elegant writing and sharp dialogue mark this bittersweet account."—Booklist

“In this memoir, the twentysomething couple make their stand amid bald eagles, elk and snow of rural northern Idaho, where they dream of having and raising their daughter. . . . It's a moving memoir of how far some will go to hold on to a dream without sacrificing their values.”—Katharine Mieszkowski, Los Angeles Times

“Hannah and the Mountain is a timeless memoir of two people’s unique intersection with landscape, imagination, hope, and love. It contains hard truths and great beauty. The subject—making a life of worth and fullest possible engagement, particularly under challenging circumstances—is universal, and powerfully wrought.”—Rick Bass, author of The Hermit’s Story and Winter: Notes from Montana

“Hannah and the Mountain is a wonderfully troubling story of a young couple who chose to go entirely their own way. It is ultimately a love story written with great intensity and skill, and not for the faint of heart but for those who can accept the full burden of consciousness. This is a book you don’t have a chance of forgetting.”—Jim Harrison, author of Legends of the Fall

“A memoir of Johnson and his wife, Amy, trying to live in a rustic log cabin, 'Hannah and the Mountain' turns into a look at how life often intervenes, often not kindly, when least expected.”—Spokesman-Review

"Hannah and the Mountain is a wonderfully articulated, sometimes heartbreaking but ultimately heartening, sumptuous hymn to life. Jonathan Johnson is to be congratulated and cherished."—William Kittredge, author of The Nature of Generosity and The Best Stories of William Kittredge

“In this intimate and, at times, heartbreaking chronicle of making a home the hard way, the author details the rocky road to fatherhood and the compromises made along the way.”—Lewiston Tribute

"Poet Jonathan Johnson . . . Has written a love song and elegy about the power of place. . . . This brave, true book that, like Tolstoy once said, issues forth from a wound . . . Is turned into an instrument of beauty and grace so that sorrow, in the end, is transformed into song."—Pete Markus, Detroit Metrotimes

“Hannah and the Mountain reads much like a diary intertwined with Johnson’s narrative touches and background details to paint a story of pain and perseverance. Johnson pored over his notes for seven years, shaping and editing the struggles he and his wife shared as they tried to start a family in a cabin without water, plumbing or electricity.”—Kalamazoo Gazette

"Johnson's skillful dialogue, attention to detail, and empathy for life make Hannah and the Mountain a memorable account. In one sense, it is the story of ordinary lives. The beauty of this story is that, in the telling of the ordinary, we are reminded how astonishing life really is."—Mandy Page, Western American Literature