Mountain Folk Video Guide

Episode One: “Wee Folk”

In this first episode of the Mountain Folk Video Guide John Hood explores fairy-like folklore in cultures across the world. While differing in some details, traditions about fairies have many common elements. That’s just a coincidence, surely. Isn’t it?

Episode Two: “Peak Time”

Shot at Hanging Rock State Park, this episode of John Hood’s video guide explores the role that mountains play as settings for the story of Mountain Folk — and in epic fantasy more generally.

Episode Three: “Battlefields”

In this third episode of the video guide, filmed at Kings Mountain, John Hood describes several other Revolutionary War battles depicted in Mountain Folk, such as Germantown and Yorktown.

Episode Four: “Monster Hunters”

In this fourth episode, author John Hood talks about magical monsters such as the Wampus Cat, the Tatzelwurm, and the Jersey Devil that populate his novel, which is set during the Revolutionary War. This episode was filmed at the Cryptozoology and Paranormal Museum. In Mountain Folk, fairy nations send out rangers to track down monsters and then deploy hunting parties to capture or slay the beasts.

Episode Five: “Historic Homes”

In this fifth episode, shot at the reconstructed Tryon Palace in New Bern, NC, John Hood looks at historic homes featured in the novel, including Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, George Washington’s Mount Vernon, Daniel Boone’s log cabins, and the traditional homes and council houses of the Cherokee.

Episode Six: “Book Value”

Shot in front of a historic home in Bath, NC, where one of America‘s first libraries was established, this episode explores a key plot point. The human characters who can see through the magical disguises of fairy folk in the novel all happen to love reading books with fantastical or mythological elements.

Episode Seven: “Folk Heroes”

Shot at Boone’s Cave Park in Davidson County, NC, this episode profiles frontiersman Daniel Boone, the Revolutionary War General Peter Muhlenberg, and the Cherokee heroine Nanyehi. They all serve as point-of-view characters in John Hood’s new novel. They were real people, of course, but as storytellers embellished their adventures, they became legendary heroes.

Episode Eight: “Twists of Fate”

Shot in front of the reconstructed Fort Dobbs, a French and Indian War site, this episode of the Mountain Folk Video Guide shows author John Hood talking about the quirky accidents and seemingly minor decisions that so often shape the course of history. In the world of “Mountain Folk,” these twists of fate can have magical explanations. . .

Episode Nine: “Faithful Folk”

Shot in Bath, North Carolina — in front of one of the oldest surviving church buildings in the South — this episode explores the religious themes in John Hood’s new novel Mountain Folk. One of the main characters, Peter Muhlenberg, is a minister-turned-general. Others quote scripture or pray for divine guidance as they pursue peace and justice in early America.

Episode Ten: “Turning the Knob”

Now that the new novel Mountain Folk has been released, this episode explains why John Hood wrote the book — and explores the most-important setting of Mountain Folk, the fairy village hidden atop North Carolina’s Pilot Mountain.