There’s a lot to like in Tommy Carbone’s new novel, The Elephant Mountain Gang, subtitled Mystery at Maine’s Moosehead Lake.

I really liked that Tommy put his stories in real places in the Greenville-Moosehead Lake area, where I’ve spent a lot of time. It made me feel like I was right there with his characters. Well, actually, I was. About 2/3 of the way through the book, there’s a character named George Smith – and it’s me!

There’s a lot going on in this novel, from a group of nasty guys stealing things from camps to the crash of a huge plane. And some of the stories are based on real things. For example, a B52 plane did crash near Greenville in 1962 on Elephant mountain, and Linda and I visited that memorial crash site during a visit to Greenville.

I don’t want to give away too much of the story, but I will say Tommy’s characters are very real.

And I must warn you, have plenty of time set aside because you’re not going to want to stop reading. And when you finish the book, you’re going to want to visit Greenville and Moosehead Lake!