Tall Poppy Review: Moving Mountains to Bury Scandalous Secrets

When Mountains Move by Julie Cantrell

In New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Julie Cantrell’s lyrical and haunting debut, Into the Free, all Millie Reynolds wanted was to escape her toxic family, the poor Mississippi town she’d called home her whole life, and her life, period. In the sequel, When Mountains Move (Thomas Nelson), we catch up with Millie exactly where she always wanted to be: free—on the cusp of marriage to a man she loves and an exciting cross-country move to a ranch in Colorado. But life in Colorado is not all a winsome adventure for Millie and her new husband, Bump. In the middle of a war and on the heels of the Great Depression, the newlyweds have only three years to turn the run-down ranch around. As with any rural enterprise, Bump and Millie also struggle with keeping their animals, and their family, safe and healthy. Then there’s the cast of characters who come with the ranch, including Kat, a neighbor who tempts Bump at the same time as offering Millie’s only opportunity for friendship, and Fortner, a good worker but someone also rumored to have murdered two people. And hanging over it all, the dark cloud of what happened to Millie only weeks before her wedding—a secret she’s vowed to keep hidden from her husband, no matter the cost. Secrets have a way of surfacing, though. And this one does, in spectacular fashion, causing Millie to question if faith, hope, and love are enough to beat back the pain of her past. Sequels are tricky beasts. It’s sometimes difficult for them to measure up to the allegiances a reader forms to the first in a series. However, When Mountains Move not only measures up, it stands true and tall all on its own. Readers who weren’t satiated when they finished Into the Free will enjoy following along with Millie’s continued journey, and their reading of the first book in the series will provide welcome context and complexity to the experience of reading When Mountains Move. However, Cantrell so magically weaves a seamless story—without any redundancy—readers who find themselves introduced to Millie only as she embarks on married life in the second book will enjoy it fully and completely without having read Into the Free. Cantrell paints her characters with an unrivaled depth of knowledge, understanding, and compassion and draws the wilds of Colorado in such detail that you can almost smell the horses’ sweet breath and snow-swept plains, can almost hear the delicate scream of a mountain lion. Her writing, along with the story itself, is measured and beautiful, heartbreaking and hopeful. It’s a story for anyone who wants to read about how love finds its way, no matter what. And isn’t that, really, every last one of us? When Mountains Move is now available.