In the Shadow of the Cumberlands

This novel by Frederick William Powers depicts Kentucky mountain life in the post-Civil War period, focusing on Tobe Sexton, an aging mountaineer and skilled musician living in the Cumberland region. The narrative opens with Sexton contemplating his lifetime home while his sixteen-year-old daughter, Lady Sexton, confronts him about his illicit whiskey-making. Lady, educated away from the mountains, pleads with him to abandon moonshining and honor a deathbed promise to her mother, citing the danger of federal marshals. Sexton, however, justifies his operation through Biblical interpretation and resents what he views as Northern oppression and taxation following the Civil War, during which he served with Morgan's Raiders. The conflict between the old man's traditional mountain values and his daughter's education and moral convictions drives the narrative. The text introduces a mysterious traveler approaching along the mountain road, suggesting coming complications to the household's precarious situation.