THE NINTH PASSAGE by Dale Cloninger

Set in a small coastal town in Florida during the 1950’s this story occurs at a time when the State stood poised on the verge of rapid development that changed sleepy fishing and citrus villages into developers’ fantasies faster than community mores and attitudes could keep pace. Dean Collins home for a class reunion, recounts to his new younger wife the story of Alec Driver, a WWII veteran, Ivy League graduate and Connecticut Yankee who arrived almost 50 years earlier in Clearwater as part of an advance wave of northeastern and Midwestern migrants that would soon engulf the Florida peninsula.

No ordinary migrant, Alec receives an appointment as the music teacher at the local high school and sojourns to Florida on foot. Strangers are not yet the norm in small Florida towns and Alec becomes conspicuous immediately upon his arrival. Apart from his mode of transportation he further distinguishes himself by falling in love with Tracy Ashbury, the town’s princess; an attractive, talented and intelligent student twenty years his junior. Upset by this flagrant act of defiance of community norms, citizens of the town become further enraged when he strikes a jealous and resentful student with his fist.

Alec, on the brink of losing his hard-won position, salvages his career and amorous plans with his musical and orchestral talent. The performance of his choirs saves his job by impressing the community’s musically inclined citizens. His fortunes continue to improve through his marriage to Tracy and the receipt of national awards for music education and direction including a stirring performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Ultimately, his intransigence and disregard for the feelings of others leads to misfortune as Tracy wrestles control of her life from him. She leaves Alec for James Davies, a young prospective attorney from a prominent local family taking Alec’s only child, Richard, with her. Despondent, Alec turns to alcohol and evinces symptoms of manic depression until suddenly he appears to recover. The apparent recovery is nothing more than a ruse. Alec carefully plans his revenge upon those who he feels rejected him. He commits suicide and snubs the community through a request left behind in a suicide note.

Inspired by a series of actual events, THE NINTH PASSAGE is the story of how a man whose energy, ingenuity, and dedication to self determined goals leads to unprecedented successes in his adopted community, or so it seems.