On Bear Mountain A Novel
"Ursula Powell is a modern Southern woman who returns home to the small town of her childhood in the Georgia mountains when her father dies. Still looming the backyard of Ursula's secluded farm is an abstract iron sculpture of a bear, which has been a symbolic and powerful presence in the lives of Ursula, her brother, and the rest of her family since the day it was commissioned years before from a struggling New York artist named Richard Riconni. Ursula's autistic brother believes that the bear embodies the spirit of their dead mother, and it is a great shock when Quentin Riconni, son of the sculptor whose work has become posthumously famous, comes to the small Georgia town to reclaim the sculpture. He offers Ursula millions of dollars for it, money that could solve all the problems of this dirt-poor community. Or could it? In his wallet, Quentin carries a faded photograph of Ursula and her father standing in front of the iron bear. Quentin and Ursula have never met but have been in each other's lives since they were children..." --Front and back jacket flaps.