Set in the small North Texas town of Burro in 1980–81, Pitching Tents 
is the unusual story of Vida Singer, eighty years of age, and Wayman 
Ezekial Scott, sixty-five. A rich, fast-paced, carefully constructed story 
of character, time, and place, this is a vital, comic, and touching novel 
of differing freedoms and loves as Vida and Wayman find a way to 
pitch a movable tent.

    "So you think Texas has all calmed down now, becoming more 
suburbia than wild and wooly frontier? Well, look again. The fully 
realized and remembered and untamed people, places, and things to 
be found in the pages of Pitching Tents will have you laughing out loud 
even as you disabuse yourself of all such stereotypes and easy 
assumptions. Pitching Tents is proof positive that the tall tale is alive 
and kicking and the frontier is far from forgotten."—George Garrett, 
Series Final Judge

    "In his new novel, Pitching Tents, author Gail Mount gives us a 
perceptive look at what hippies do when they age. His read is right-on, 
his insights discerning. Would you believe that since the Hippie 
Happening all is not lost? Gail Mount does a good job with Pitching 
Tents in assuring us continuity of American ethic as we know and prize 
it. Pitching Tents is a tour-de-force in this regard."—Robert Winship, 
author of The Brushlanders, Every Man Also, and Flannery's Crossing.

_________________________________________________________

GAIL MOUNT was born in Ft. Worth. The family lived in Rock 
Crossing, Electra, and Vernon before moving to Houston when Gail 
was nine. He graduated from Rice University and was a teaching 
fellow at the University of Texas. Married and the father of two sons, 
he spent most of his life as a marine and energy insurance broker. 
Mount's work has appeared in The Texas Observer, The Texas Journal 
of Ideas, History, and Culture, and The Utne Review.  His plays, The 
Offing and Vicissitudes, had successful readings in Houston theatre, 
and The Offing had a concert reading in New York in April 2001.



What people are saying about this book

"I picked this book up on a Sunday evening and did not put it down
until I was done.  It was a real page-turner. My husband had to leave
our bedroom and seek silence elsewhere because of my laughter. By 
page 40, I had been laughing so much I was crying and my diaphragm 
ached. It was a real joy to read, very entertaining."—Connie Weiher