The Hand of the Mighty, and Other Stories

Thomas R. Pendagrast, a millionaire who somehow escaped the corruption of wealth, arrives in a small valley and shatters every assumption the locals hold about rich men. He is humble, warm, genuinely interested in the lives around him. Meanwhile, Silas Quinby, a well-meaning but perpetually bewildered lawyer, stumbles into Pendagrast's orbit and immediately begins causing problems he cannot solve. What begins as a gentle comedy of manners gradually darkens into something more probing: a study of how kindness operates in a world rigged by money, how simple folks navigate systems designed to fleece them, and whether goodness can survive contact with commerce. Kester writes with the observing eye of a man who watched early American capitalism reshape small-town America, and his stories carry both affection and skepticism for the characters caught in that machinery. The collection spans several tales, but the title story establishes its central tension perfectly: can a genuinely good man remain good when everyone around him assumes the worst, and when the forces of wealth and land are already in motion? These are quiet stories with sharp teeth, funny in the way that truth is often funny.