News from the Division of Languages and Literature

Benjamin Hale, writer in residence at Bard College, was highlighted in an article in Chronogram about his new nonfiction book, Cave Mountain: A Disappearance and a Reckoning in the Ozarks, which covers his cousin’s 2001 disappearance in the Arkansas wilderness at the age of 6. “At first glance, Cave Mountain reads like true crime,” writes Brian K. Mahoney. “A child disappears. A massive search ensues. The wilderness becomes a stage for suspense and survival. Yet Hale’s narrative quickly veers into stranger territory,” as Hale uncovers a darker history surrounding the mountain where his cousin was lost, which had been the site of a cult-related murder of a child decades before. Hale considered adapting the story into a fictional work before concluding that “the story really only works as nonfiction,” he told Chronogram. “It’s so weird it wouldn’t be believable as a novel.”

Hale will discuss the book in conversation with Ryan Chapman at Oblong Books in Rhinebeck on March 12 at 6 pm.