In the Shadow of Agiocochook: Stories from the Land of the Shapeshifter

Agiocochook, renamed Mt. Washington in 1820 to honor George Washington, is front and center in the collective psyche of New Hampshire identity and can be seen looming on the horizon from most heights of land in New Hampshire as well as well out to sea. Like Mt. Washington, New Hampshirites, are strong willed, unbending in a tempest and can create storms all by themselves. New Hampshirites are also as tough and in some cases as unmoving as the granite rock pile itself. In short, as a result of Agiocochook's majestic presence, New Hampshire is in the Shadow of Agiocochook. As in the two previous volumes, "Land of the Shapeshifter" and "Shapeshifter's Peace - Passaconaway's Path to Peace," "In the Shadow of Agiocochook - Stories from the Land of the Shapeshifter" is based on Native American oral histories, teachings and traditions, their shapes shifted to give new depth and understanding and to also fill in where gaps of knowledge exist. Some of the stories in this collection, such as "The Necklace," "A Moment of Kindness Remembered Forever" and "The Good, the Bad and the To Be Seen" were written about Stephen's ancestors and based on research of historical facts, as known at the time, and then expanded into the realm of possibility. The stories "Jibayskweda" and "the Ice Hearted Metee-kolen-ol" are loosely based on Abenaki legends. The poem "The Door" was written after the author's experience at Historical Deerfield that left him numb and unable to move as he stood in front of it, not realizing his personal connection to the event that resulted in the huge gash into the door. The powerful and provocative poem "Just Died Off" was written from the perspective of those Abenaki whose voice fails them in articulating the pain they feel inside their hearts for all that transpired during these past 400 years since the arrival of European settlers.