CONFLAGRATION

In Gordon’s historical novel, a newly married couple move to Peshtigo, Wisconsin, shortly before the town is consumed by the deadliest wildfire in U.S. history.

On the night of October 8, 1871, the Peshtigo blaze killed more people than any other recorded wildfire. A year before the disaster, Jennie Lenerville of Manitowoc Rapids, Wisconsin, marries “Big John” Mulligan. Very much in love, the couple leave for Peshtigo, where John has secured a job as foreman of a logging camp. Jennie, however, is haunted by prophetic dreams in which she finds herself underwater while a red glow hovers above. Despite these dreams, the couple settle into life in Peshtigo and form relationships with a broad cast of characters, including Reinhard Bruener, a widower with six daughters; Annabelle Kroessle, who tragically loses her husband in an accident shortly before the birth of their baby; and a Menominee woman named Elizabeth Place, who gifts Jennie a dreamcatcher after she defends her against racist rhetoric, among many others. When the fire inevitably comes, it brings unprecedented devastation. The Peshtigo tragedy is largely overshadowed by the Great Chicago Fire of 1871; Gordon’s novel brings attention to one of the deadliest yet most often-overlooked events in American history with great detail and well-crafted prose: “Old hands and the Menominee people read the signs—horses spooking at nothing, hot veering winds at dusk, the western horizon keeping a low red bruise—as small fires common to such seasons began knitting into something larger just beyond sight.” The author acknowledges and sensitively portrays the racism experienced by Elizabeth and the other members of the Indigenous population as they take note of the early warning signs of imminent disaster ignored by most of the white settlers. While the narrative sometimes gets bogged down in the details, introducing so many characters and plot threads that the pacing prior to the fire is slowed, history buffs and those interested in a slice-of-life representation of frontier America will find much to enjoy here.

A richly detailed account of an under-heralded American tragedy.