RADIO FREE VERMONT: A FABLE OF RESISTANCE
(November 2017)
Bill McKibben
Blue River Press, 240
pages
★★
If a crusty Vermonter laced a pint of Ben & Jerry’s with
a psychotropic, consumed it, and went off to bed, his dream might come out
something like Radio Free Vermont.
This uneven book is fun and pokes fun at Corporate America run amok, but the
key to reading is embracing the word “fable” in its subtitle. I am a big fan of
eco activist/journalist Bill McKibbin—one of the most important voices on
climate change in North America. McKibbin has authored sixteen non-fiction
books and has written for every publication from The Atlantic and The New York
Times to National Geographic and Rolling Stone, but Radio Free Vermont is his first novel. Objectivity demands that I
say that as much as I enjoyed the novel’s sentiments and politics, McKibben is,
by disposition, a non-fiction writer.
Radio Free Vermont
is the sort of book that those of us feeling alienated and hopeless in the Age
of Trump want to love. Its central character is Vern Barclay, a radio talk show
host weaned on Paul Harvey. He’s not a Vermont native, but at age 72 his Green
Mountain pedigree is longer than most. After all, there were fewer than 390,000
Vermont residents in 1960 and now the state is approaching two-thirds of a
million. Through a series of unplanned (but not necessarily unwanted)
circumstances, Barclay becomes a pirate podcast broadcaster, the leader of a
secession movement, and a fugitive from justice. He is aided by OCD technical
wiz Perry Alterson; Sylvia, a lesbian firefighter from Starksboro; Trace
Harper, a lesbian and former Olympian gold medal biathlete; his acerbic
98-year-old mother; and a host of snowmobilers, cross-country skiers, and
backwoods folks who share his view that Big Money is ruining the state’s environment, character, and sense of
community. On Ethan Allen Day* (January 21), Barclay launches a podcast
campaign to have secession** placed on the March agenda of Town Meetings across
the state—a half-jocular effort initially born out of frustration more than
seriousness. As is transpires, it takes on a life of its own.
The villains include Leslie R. Bruce, Vermont’s Trump-echo
governor; the FBI; Walmart; and even some fellow Vermonters scared the
secession would put an end to their Social Security checks, bank accounts,
federal jobs, access to out-of-state goods, and pensions. In the post-9/11
world, Barclay is easy to package as a terrorist, and McKibben’s novel adopts a
caper-and-chase structure punctuated with splashes of satire. Few other states
have been as successful at creative-bordering-on-deceptive branding; that is,
unless you think its hills truly are alive with shade-grown coffee beans, salsa
fixings, cracker trees, and gin wells. McKibben gives this a gentle tweak by
having Barclay open his broadcasts with plugs for real Vermont products,
especially its craft beers. He also satirizes the promote-at-any-cost crowd by
having feckless Governor Bruce build a retractable dome arena, which makes a
nice foil for Barclay’s on-the-lam broadcasts that air under the tag line:
“underground, underpowered, and “underfoot.”
To borrow the slogan from a very bad no-craft beer, Radio Free Vermont often tastes great,
but it’s not terribly filling. Its climactic chase scene and Burlington
showdown are absurd even for a fable, the dialogue and plot devices fall on the
contrived end of the scale, and those who know Vermont will tell you that it’s
not nearly as tolerant and PC as McKibben would have it. To pick one example, I
suspect that most of its residents couldn’t even name a Nina Simone song, let alone choose her “O-o-h Child” as their
national anthem. Naomi Klein (charitably) links Radio Free Vermont to stories from A Prairie Home Companion. I agree that it has the same sweet
intentions, but McKibben is no Garrison Keillor when it comes to literary
prowess. We don’t need him to be this; he’s a champion at what he does best:
investigative journalism and environmental advocacy. Radio Free Vermont will certainly entertain you and it’s a welcome
diversion from the 24/7 bad news coming out of Washington. Read it, but don’t
expect McKibben’s insights into the Green Mountain State to be as sharp as what
he has to say about green energy.
Rob
Weir
*McKibben is more romantic about Ethan Allen than I. Allen’s
role in the Revolutionary War and
the Republic of Vermont is secure, but he was also rash, reckless, a
self-promoter and a land speculator.
**McKibben isn’t being entirely fanciful in imagining an
independent Vermont. It was independent immediately after the revolutionary War
and, in the 1970s, some back-to-the-land hippies were involved in the “Free
Vermont” movement. There is also a small contemporary group the advocates a
“Second Vermont Republic.”
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