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Published in 1960 when Don Berry was 27, Trask is often mentioned in the same breath as Ken Kesey's Sometimes a Great Notion as the finest Oregon novel ever written. Set along the northern Oregon coast range in the late 1840s, Trask was inspired by the life of settler, mountain man, and fur trapper Elbridge Trask (for whom both a river and a mountain are named here in the Beaver State). Trask is more than mere historical fiction, however; it is also an insightful and exceptionally well-crafted novel that captures the great uncertainty and promise the settlers undoubtedly knew all too well.