Through Black Spruce - Softcover

Boyden, Joseph

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0143116509 ISBN 13: 9780143116509

Publisher: Penguin Books, 2010

Synopsis

A haunting novel of love, identity, and loss-from the internationally acclaimed author of Three Day Road

Beautifully written and startlingly original, Through Black Spruce takes the considerable talents of Canadian novelist Joseph Boyden to new and exciting heights. This is the story of two immensely compelling characters: Will Bird, a legendary Cree bush pilot who lies comatose in a remote Ontario hospital; and Annie Bird, Will's niece, a beautiful loner and trapper who has come to sit beside her uncle's bed. Broken in different ways, the two take silent communion in their unspoken kinship, revealing a story rife with heartbreak, fierce love, ancient feuds, mysterious disappearances, murders, and the bonds that hold a family, and a people, together. From the rugged Canadian wilderness to the drug-fueled glamour of the Manhattan club scene, this is thrilling, atmospheric storytelling at its finest.

About this title

Review:

Joseph Boyden's novel is, simply, beautiful: you will lose yourself in the richness of its prose and the ever-deepening puzzles it inveigles you into. THROUGH BLACK SPRUCE is fluent, involving fiction, and as good an advertisement as any for unforgiving wilderness living. (Tim Teeman THE TIMES)

This complex and interesting novel is all about strong family bonds. (HOT STARS)

a remarkable view into a lost world dismantled so brutally by the white 'wemestikushu'... Boyden guides us through customs, mythologies and rituals that attend life in the bush. (TLS)

mesmerising. In the wild, dreams are prophetic and spiritual truths revealed... his characters are most moving when revelations occur in small, quite moments. (Julie Wheelwright THE INDEPENDENT)

It is a powerful novel of place and the ties that bind families... A fine achievement, Through Black Spruce is extraordinary. (IRISH EXAMINER)

love, betrayal and loss in the wild and frozen Canadian wilderness. A strangely haunting read. (CHOICE)

Alternating between life at its most elemental and most decadent, Boyden's tale skilfully reflects the Indians' struggle to embrace modern society. (Anthony Gardner MAIL ON SUNDAY)

Book Description:

From internationally acclaimed author Joseph Boyden comes an astonishingly powerful novel of contemporary aboriginal life, full of the dangers and harsh beauty of both forest and city.

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 0143116509
• ISBN 13: 9780143116509
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 368