Cold Mountain

COLD MOUNTAIN

The story of "Cold Mountain" is a best selling novel and it is the first

book written by Charles Frazier. It took years of research before he could

write this novel.

The plot of Cold Mountain is really and old idea, in fact it is an ancient one. The plot is the same as the one in an ancient book by Homer.

The story I am referring to is "The Odyssey". The Odyssey is a book

about a wounded soldier trying to find his way back home and his

sweetheart, Penelope that is waiting for his return. Cold Mountain is the

story of a wounded Confederate soldier that was wounded, deserts, and

begins a journey back to his home in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North

Carolina, Cold Mountain.

The plot of the book has two parallel stories. The first part of the plot is

about a man named Inman. Inman is a Confederate soldier that is wounded

in Virginia and spends several months in a hospital. After sneaking out of

the hospital, he starts on his journey back home to his sweetheart, Ada.

His odyssey is his long journey back to the Blue Ridge Mountains of

North Carolina. What makes is journey so interesting is the many

people he comes in contact with along the way.

Some of the people Inman comes in contact with are kind to him. They

give him a place to stay and sometimes even a hot meal. Some of the other

characters aren't so kind to him. The Civil War is still raging on and the

Home guard is constantly hunting for deserters like him. There are many

perils along the way and several times, Inman almost loses his life.

The second part of the plot in this story is about Inman's sweetheart,

Ada. Ada has a much different odyssey than Inman, but just as perilous.

She is learning about herself, friendship, and survival.

In the beginning, Ada is trying to cope with the death of her father. Her

father, a preacher, bought her to the mountains and kept her sheltered from

the ways of the world. While he tried to give her a good life, he never

prepared he for the real world, as you will see later.

Ada was raised in Charleston, South Carolina. She was raised in an

aristocratic society where work was never experienced and money took

care of everything. Ada had no idea how to live from day to day