Vermont novel “Stolen Mountain” explores ski area fraud – VTDigger

In I.M. Aiken’s latest novel, EMS captain turned sleuth Brighid Doran suspects that all is not as it appears at The Branston Club, a swanky ski lodge being built in her rural Vermont town. When neighbors start going hungry and local businesses are threatened, Brighid sets to investigating the club’s charismatic developer, coming up against crooked cops, greedy politicians, and a string of increasingly depraved deceptions—all while struggling to cope with the deployment of her wife, Major Sarah Ann (“Sam”) Musgrave. With help from attorney Morgan Harmon and the FBI, Brighid must uncover the scheme defrauding her community of millions, even if it puts her own life on the line.

Stolen Mountain is available October 21^st in bookstores everywhere.

Reader: I.M., thanks for chatting with me. Where did the idea for Stolen Mountain come from?

Aiken: I watched the brewing of two large fraud cases in Vermont in recent decades: one in Wilmington and Dover, and the other near the Canadian border at Jay Peak. From an outsider’s perspective, it seemed as if the cases were unrelated, but the similarities were striking. Two Vermont ski areas, efforts to steal funds from local citizens and businesses, influencing state officials with tax programs and photo-ops, and other tricks common to the fraudster’s toolkit.

As I researched one case, facts from the other case would bleed in. I used the stillness of the pandemic year to travel to these projects, interviewing victims, studying local documents and newspapers, and photographing the sites. 

Stolen Mountain focuses primarily on the case involving Haystack Mountain, and the developers of The Hermitage Club. Haystack was a small and private ski area in Wilmington and Dover. The vision of The Hermitage, as explained in the local papers, was to create an exclusive resort for wealthy patrons who would fly in and out of a local airport. But the locals paid a hefty price.

Reader: “Ripped from the headlines,” as they say?

Aiken: Inspired, yes. Faithful to the facts? No. Stolen Mountain is fiction, because if I stuck with the facts, my readers would hate me. Fraud is actually very boring and predictable. Con cons locals and politicians with grand ideas, gets great deals, starts doing things, then “forgets” to pay bills. The bad guy decides he’s too big to fail and the local economy is suddenly dependent on his project, employment scheme, and investment. The real bad guy simply walked away with the money. In my book, I am just not that forgiving. There are a few fun twists and turns. 

Reader: Your main character, Brighid, is a lot of fun to read. Tell me about her. This isn’t the first time your loyal readers will meet her, is it?

Aiken: I wanted to expand on two of my favorite secondary characters from my previous novel The Little Ambulance War of Winchester County, released last year. Our hero, Brighid, is an advanced EMT and captain on the rescue squad in her fictitious town of Trowbridge, Vermont. She comes with classic Yankee moxie and keeps getting interrupted by 911 calls. Her wife, Sam, is a career army officer. For those in the know, I have been publishing short stories monthly on Substack, where readers can get to know Brighid, Sam, and the Trowbridge rescue squad. The stories are free. You can find them here: https://TrowbridgeDispatch.IamAiken.com. Each story stands alone and can be read in any order. I just keep writing about the same people in the same places while ignoring timelines.

Reade: So tell me more about the plot of Stolen Mountain. Obviously, Brighid is investigating this big fraud. What else is going on?

Aiken: Twenty years ago, I reported for duty at the military base in Killeen, Texas, the then-home of the U.S. Army’s 4^th Infantry Division. I was a civilian assigned into a military unit as a subject matter expert. My boss was a major, and together we managed a platoon of fifteen soldiers and one coast guard member. When I was deployed overseas, the military had already dismissed nearly 5,000 service members for being queer. The timeline of the original Hermitage fraud case straddled the reversal of “Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell,” so the discrimination against queer soldiers is woven tightly into the novel. Of course, when drafting this work, I assumed that these days were behind us. Suddenly, exploring queer folks in public service and military roles seems contemporary.

Also, I questioned why Vermont was a target for two large fraud cases that related to land, development, and ski areas. Although I offer no blame, I did explore how Vermont reviews and approves development projects. We run them through environmental reviews during the permitting process. While writing, I researched how Vermont investigates financial crimes. I didn’t find much.

I wonder if financial integrity ought to be as important as environmental planning. As a novelist, I can explore these questions freely (I hope, still).

And because I have been in public service since my teen years, I’ve tossed in my normal 911 and rescue squad antics and drama. Bringing the spice to everyday community heroes we find in Vermont towns.

Reader: Where can readers find the book?

Aiken: It will be available at any bookstore from October 21^st. I have a funny feeling that booksellers near Jay Peak and The Hermitage Club will have abundant inventory. I encourage folks to buy the audiobook, which is read by me. It can be found on Libro.fm or any other place where audiobooks are sold.

Reader: Thanks so much, I.M. Readers can pre-order Stolen Mountain from Bartleby’s Books in Wilmington here: https://myvermontbookstore.com/book/9781963511284, or from Flying Pig Bookstore in Shelburne here: https://flyingpigbooks.com/book/9781963511284. Readers elsewhere can pre-order the paperback or e-book from Bookshop.org here: https://bookshop.org/p/books/stolen-mountain-i-m-aiken/19d770bf30de31fa?ean=9781963511284.