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    Through Black Spruce
    Through Black Spruce
    Through Black Spruce
    Audiobook15 hours

    Through Black Spruce

    Written by Joseph Boyden

    Narrated by Ali Ahn and James Jenner

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Joseph Boyden's first novel, Three Day Road, was a Today Show Book Club selection. Through Black Spruce is the exceptional follow-up to his acclaimed debut. Cree bush pilot Will Bird lies comatose in a hospital, while his wayward niece Annie arrives to sit in silent vigil by his side. Slowly their stories reveal two people previously separated by great distances, beaten and broken, and searching for some sense of where they belong in the world.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRecorded Books, Inc.
    Release dateMay 29, 2009
    ISBN9781440718335
    Through Black Spruce
    Author

    Joseph Boyden

    Joseph Boyden is the Scotiabank Giller Prize–winning author of Three Day Road and Through Black Spruce.

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    Reviews for Through Black Spruce

    4/5

    336 ratings35 reviews

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    • 5/5
      What an incredible and beautiful journey into the lives and culture of the Mushkegowuk (Cree) People of Ontario. Perfectly written in every way. I shall now plan my trip to James Bay. AND... Joseph Boyden may now be my new favorite author!
    • 5/5
      This wasn't an easy book or a fast read. It was a beautifully written and painful story to be savored. The parallel journeys of Will and Annie are fascinating. The descriptions of the natural world and the plight of Canada's First Nations are mean to be pondered. I hadn't ready Boyden's previous book but certainly plan to!
    • 4/5
      Joseph Boyden is a Canadian treasure and reading about the lives of a family from Northern Ontario was both thrilling and enthralling. Boyden's deft use of voice is demonstrated so well in this novel, occupying the same world as Three Day Road, and alternates between the perspective of Annie Bird and her uncle, Will Bird. The best parts of the narrative are when Boyden is moving through the lives of the people on James Bay and the breaks of lyricism associated with the landscape and the practices of hunting. I found myself a bit disenchanted with the descriptions of Toronto, Montreal and New York and yearned to be back in James Bay during each interlude away, perhaps this is part of Boyden's intention as his characters all have an inexorable pull to their home.
    • 4/5
      Three Day Road, Boyden's breathtaking novel, is one of my favorite books, and I was really excited to read Boyden's latest. He is a wonderful writer who takes the reader into the world of Native Canadians, then brings us along as his characters interact with the "southern" world.

      This book has two main characters, an uncle and his niece, and they tell their entwined stories in alternating chapters. As I finished each chapter I wanted to continue with that narrator, but then I became engrossed with the alternate narrator, and marveled as the story advanced and the past and the present met and completed the story. It is a wonderful story, perhaps not as heartbreaking and soaring as 3DR, but a satisfying read nonetheless.

      As an aside, Boyden is a charming and entertaining speaker, so if you ever have the chance to see him read/talk, go!
    • 2/5
      This one had no clear resolution, which was disappointing for me. There was not final circling of threads to make it all make sense. Characters did not come to a full change, rather there was an archetypal villan who was ultimately murdered and then the story wove to a rough conclusion over a hospital bed. I thought it was not well thought out, for all that the prose in places was very beautiful. I also did not like any of the old man's sections, especially since they were narrated in second person and ultimately started skimming through them around the middle of the book just to get them over with.
    • 4/5
      Will bird is a Cree bush pilot. The novel opens with him, lying in a coma. Annie Bird is his niece, who visits him in the hospital. How these two people ended up here, is how the story is structured, as the narrative shifts from Will to Annie. I much preferred the Will part of the tale, with his laconic, Cree wisdom and stunning descriptions of life in the wilderness, but the book is well-written and captures life in upper-Canada, in a vivid, robust style. Fans of Louise Erdrich should really like this author.
    • 4/5
      I was really taken by this story about a young Cree woman from Northern Ontario, Annie Bird, trying to find her younger sister in the jungle of the big cities—Toronto, Montreal, NYC. Suzanne Bird ran away with a drug dealing boyfriend, and though she had a successful modelling career, none of her friends knows where she has gone to or whether she is still even alive. The chapters alternate between Annie's narration and her uncle Will Bird, who is relating the recent past to us from the depths of a coma following events that we learn about as the story unfolds. Annie is convinced by a nurse at Will's hospital that she needs to talk to her uncle as much as possible if there's any hope of him ever recovering, so she tells him about her journey as she tried to locate her sister and plunged into Suzanne's superficial world of beautiful people, electronic music and drugs on the one hand, and then her evolving relationship with a man who has been appointed as her guardian, Gordon "Painted Tongue", a Native Indian who wandered around the streets of Toronto until they met. Unlike her glamorous sister, Annie has always loved hunting and trapping in the wilds, something she has in common with her uncle and is trying to teach Gordon. There is an element of the mystery thriller to this novel, but the quality of the writing and complexity of the characters make for great literature. As an animal lover, I had a hard time with all the animal killings, and there is one particularly sad and gruesome scene involving a large mammal the first part of the book, which at least had the merit that the reader sees it coming almost from the get-go. I'm glad I've finally read something by Boyden, and looking forward to more, though I'll have to brace myself for more violence, as many readers have commented this aspect of his other novels.
    • 3/5
      This was a difficult book to get in to - it helped to read the summary on the back cover of the book. There are two narrators and two stories in this book - the Uncle and the Niece. The narrators alternate between chapters. At times, I got so engrossed in one story, that I was disappointed to switch to the other's story. As I read further, I found both stories captivating. The northern Ontario setting and the Anishnabe persective were interesting for me.
    • 4/5
      Joseph Boyden's THROUGH BLACK SPRUCE won the prestigious Scotiabank Giller Prize a few years back and I had read good things about it, so when I found it at a local library sale last month I snatched it up. It starts out well, a tale of two alternating voices: one of them Will Bird, former daredevil bush pilot from Moosonee in far northern Ontario, now badly broken from a savage beating and barely clinging to life in a deep coma; the other voice that of his niece, Annie Bird, sitting vigil at his hospital bedside, telling him of her recent travels and travails in the big cities of Toronto, Montreal and New York, searching for her missing sister, Suzanne, a beautiful and successful model who got mixed up with drugs and pushers. Whew! Long setup sentence that, huh? The story alludes to the effects of the forced attendance of Native American children at a local residential school run by brutal Jesuits - a practice which tore families apart and attempted to destroy a language and way of life. There are also bitter blood feuds between the Native American Cree families involved, as well as beautiful descriptions of the hard and unforgiving wilderness country and small towns around the Moose River and James Bay and the fading tribal culture of hunting and fishing. It's also a tale of love, loss and struggles to build new lives, for both Will and Annie.So it's certainly got all the elements of a great read. The problem is it simply goes on and on a bit too long, to the point where it becomes almost tedious, and you wish Boyden would just cut to the chase and maybe the point. But he never really does. The story simply winds slowly down to a conclusion that is rather anticlimactic. It's a kind of happily-ever-after ending, but one I found a bit unrealistic and even disappointing. And while I didn't dislike the book, I did think the story could have been a lot better. As I've already said, there is some absolutely beautiful writing here, and I would recommend the book for that, but I do think an astute, skillful and caring editor could have vastly improved the story.
    • 3/5
      Two stories intertwine. One is the story of Will Bird, aging son of the WWI war hero Xavier Bird whose story was told in Boyden’s first novel, Three Day Road. The other is the story of Annie, Will’s niece and heir to his father’s and great aunt’s talents as a spirit walker. Annie’s tale is told to the comatose Will in an effort to rouse him from his injury induced coma. Annie has been south to Toronto and on to Montreal and New York in search of her missing sister, Suzanne, whose meteoric rise in the world of high fashion is nearly as mysterious as her equally sudden vanishing. Annie traces Suzanne’s steps even to the point of becoming a model herself and slipping under the drug-fueled thrall of glamour parties, trance music, and sexual desire. Fortunately for Annie, she has picked up a protector in the mute native, Gordon, whose loyalty is unlimited. As Annie tells her tale to her prostrate uncle in the hospital in Moose Factory she both reveals herself and also comes to know herself, especially as this relates to her roots. For as well as being incredibly beautiful and sexy, Annie happens to also be a great hunter and bush person. (Yes, well, the combination does stretch credulity, but it’s just something you’ll have to go with.)Will’s story is inaudible to the waking world. In his struggle to regain consciousness he recounts some of his life as though to his two nieces. In particular he focuses upon the recent events in Moosonee during which he has been in a simmering feud with the local native drug baron, Marius Netmaker, who has it in for Will in part due to Will’s niece, Suzanne, having run off with Gus, also of the Netmaker clan. Will isn’t fully aware of the source of Marius’ anger, but he rightly assumes it has a history, which only comes to light much later. Together Will and Annie tell their stories through alternating chapters that wind around each other like a double helix, a suitable image for the genetic threads that bind each of these characters together.Through Black Spruce starts more slowly than its predecessor, Three Day Road. In some ways, I suppose, it is harder to make present day native life in northern Ontario fully believable. Certainly Annie is a bundle of conflicting influences. And even Will, who has spent his life as a daring and brave bush pilot, mixes the ancient and the technologically advanced in a volatile cocktail. But once Annie’s story has taken her south to Toronto it takes on a pace of its own. There are missteps for each of the characters, but perhaps fewer for Boyden himself. The result is a melodramatic tale enriched by its northern Cree roots which will hold your interest and, at times, provoke further thought. Gently recommended.
    • 5/5
      I will buy every Joseph Boyden book that he releases. They are all *that good*. It is hard to put my finger on exactly why his writing is so mesmerizing. Here are some thoughts: the characters are generally all quite realistic, the stories are believable (and don't follow the traditional "hero falls in love, hero fights bad guy, bad guy almost wins, hero emerges victorious" format of so many other books), the use of multiple perspectives which alternate with each chapter... what else? I think that Joseph Boyden has some of that "je ne sais quoi" that a reader doesn't encounter very often. I am crossing my fingers that The Orenda, his latest book, wins Canada Reads 2014 and Joseph Boyden becomes a household name in Canada. His writing is really that special and he deserves to be recognized as one of the best, unique, magical authors alive today.If you are unsure where to start with Boyden, do not start with Through Black Spruce. If anything, you must read Three Day Road before this one, as it is a sequel of sorts. The Orenda is fantastic and can be enjoyed before or after these two. Born With a Tooth can similarly be read before or after the others.
    • 4/5
      This is an amazing book - totally swept me in.
    • 5/5
      Through Black Spruce introduces us to the next two generations of the Bird family. We first met the family in [Three Day Road] on Xavier Bird's journey through the war. This next installment introduces us to Xavier's son Will Bird, who is in a coma, and Will's niece Annie Bird, who is having a rough time in life. They alternate telling each other the tale of how their recent experiences have brought them both to the point they are currently in their lives. They each share their tales of struggle with their own vices and trying to fit into the world around them. Both are engaging story tellers.This was a book that I did not want to put down, each chapter end makes the reader want to read another chapter. I forgot my book at work one night and felt like I was going through withdrawal. Highly recommended.
    • 3/5
      This is the story of the Bird family of Moosonee, Ontario as told in the form of alternating chapters from the point of view of Annie and her uncle, who is laying in a coma in the local hospital. Moosonee's way up there near James Bay and is inaccessible by road. Will is a former bush pilot with a drinking problem, and he cares deeply for his friends and family and tries to teach his nieces about tribal traditions and how to survive in the wild and unpopulated lands around James Bay. Annie was always less popular than her sister, but when Suzanne disappears in Toronto, she is determined to find her and bring her home. Suzanne had run away with a man with connections with the drug trade and the gang members are out for revenge.I began this book with great excitement. Who doesn't want to read a story of life on wild edges of Canada? But a large portion of this book isn't set in northern Ontario, but rather in New York, where Annie becomes a model and party girl. These sections feel more like a series on the CW and fit uneasily with descriptions of setting up a winter camp on James Bay or on the daily life of the inhabitants of Moosonee. I felt like I was reading two different books, one of which I had very little interest in. Likewise, the vengeful drug lord plot, which was too much of a thriller and took away a lot of the strength of the book as a whole. I think that half of this book was fantastic and the other half sheer drudgery. I'm sure many people would love to read a book about a partying model, but they aren't necessarily the same ones who would enjoy a book about ordinary people living in a cold and wild place.
    • 5/5
      This book continues, sort of, the story started in Three Day Road. Xavier, the WWI soldier who came home missing a leg and with a dependence on morphine in Three Day Road, lived a long life and fathered at least 3 children, Antoine, Will and . One of the narrators of the book is his son Will and the other narrator is his granddaughter, Annie. Will's narration is from a hospital bed where he is in a coma although we don't know, until the very end, what caused it. Annie's story is told to Will in the hopes that the words will get through his coma.Will used to be a bush pilot until something happened to his wife and children when he gave up flying. The story about his family is a tragedy that Will never really got over. He drinks a lot and hunts and traps for a living. One day he runs afoul of Marius Netmaker, a drug pusher and all round bad guy. Marius' younger brother, Gus, and Will's niece, Suzanne, had run off south together. Suzanne is gorgeous and becomes a highly sought after model in Toronto and Montreal and New York City. Gus, it appears, is the southern connection for the Netmaker drug enterprise but suddenly he and Suzanne disappear. Annie goes to Toronto for a holiday with her friend Eva but ends up staying to look for Suzanne. She meets a mute Anishinabe, Gordon (also known as Painted Tongue), when she is beaten up by some white punks and Gordon saves her. He becomes her protector but not her lover as Annie travels in the path of Suzanne.Will and Annie share a lot of characteristics and when I think about it, Xavier had many of those characteristics as well. They are all impulsive and jump into situations without a lot of forethought. Xavier and Will and to a certain extent Annie developed dependencies on drugs and alcohol. However, on a positive note, they all care deeply about their friends and when they fall in love it is long-lasting. Of course, they all have a deep tie to the natural world. Will spends months living by himself and supplies his needs with fish and game. Annie teaches Gordon how to trap when they come back to Moose River. They acknowledge the gifts of the Creator and don't take more than the land can spare.I've grown quite attached to the Bird family. This past week the Globe and Mail had a question and answer session with Joseph Boyden and my question to him was whether he was going to fill in the events of the intervening years between Three Day Road and Through Black Spruce. This was his answer:Indeed, in the third instalment of the trilogy, I've figured out a way where I can both look back through history to the time when Xavier returns home from the war and even move forward a few years into the future in a way that I hope works well. I guess we'll just have to wait and see...Well, I'm waiting Joseph and I hope it won't be too long.
    • 4/5
      I loved the 'Will' parts of the book: finding out more about life in Moosonee, in Ontario's north and gradually discovering his life story. I was less convinced by Annie's part of the story. I just find it hard to believe that a woman capable of setting traps for beavers and martens would willingly immerse herself in the superficial world of modelling and, to some extent, be fooled by it. The parts set in New York dragged a bit, for me.
    • 3/5
      Good, generally, average writing. Made me look up where Moosonee is. Not as good as Three Day Road.
    • 5/5
      Who would have thought that a story told in part by a man in a coma could be so compelling? The narrative flips between Will Byrd, lying comatose in a hospital bed in the small town of Moose Factory, Ontario, and his emotionally wounded, yet surprisingly resilient niece, Annie. As the story unfolds, the life of present day Cree entwines with past history. Will's story is filled with back-history of his time as a bush pilot: the flights, crashes, losses, and the story of his family. Annie's story takes her to the big city, from the homeless to the world of top-fashion models, first Ontario, then Montreal, and New York, in search of her missing sister, Suzanne. Boyden beautifully creates the imagery and desolation of life in the bush camp. His portrayal of the world of high fashion shows it as equally brutal, cold, and dangerous. Unfortunately, I didn't mark any passages to record -- I was too busy reading. But one thing that I come away with is Will's realization that the devastation to native culture which compulsory schools that young Indian/Native American/Aboriginal children were forced into in his (and his mother's) youth had been replaced in today's world by the devastation of drugs. I've said that badly, and wish I could find the exact quote. The question of why Will did what he did remains up in the air. Even he was not fully convinced by his attempt to say it was "for the children". I would have liked to know more of Suzanne's story, but perhaps that's for another book. I've been told that Boyden's first book Three Day Road provides some background to the Byrd family (but is in itself a good stand alone read) and I am delighted that my local library has it on the shelf. The thought of more good reading ahead is wonderful.
    • 4/5
      Life on a Cree reservation in Moosonee, in the arctic lowlands of northern Ontario. Uncle Will, son of Xavier, is in a coma, hospitalized, while his nieces, Annie and Suzanne Bird are on his mind. His mind is telling the story of his life, of his nieces childhood, and of his worries for them. Suzanne is missing. Annie spends time at her uncle's bedside, willing him back to consciousness, and also tries to find her sister. The stories of the girls and their uncle, the past and present, are interwoven.A generation who remembers the old ways, or at least stories from their elders, trying to make a life proscribed by circumstance and government. The juxtaposition of life and time from old Canada to new; from Indian ways to town ways; from independence to dependence, on government, on drugs and on alcohol. The intermeshings and the collisions of all these things are the story of this book. This author creates a stunning sense of place, from wintertime northern Ontario in its frozen beauty, to Toronto's seedier side; from a tiny, peaceful, trapping cabin near a frozen river to a model's penthouse strewn with discarded clothing and party remnants; from the run-down nature of a reservation town to campsites in the wild north. I'm an early riser, me. … My favourite summer mornings were when the sun had begun to push through the black spruce ahead of me, pure thin threads of light heating the ground, the limbs of trees, the cold dissolving into mist. A new day. A better day for me. … A smoke or two and a cup of coffee. I'd shiver and watch the world brighten a bit at a time. … A part of life here I've been through more than fifty times.Me, I liked this book very much.
    • 5/5
      After reading Canadian author Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road last year, it was apparent that I had stumbled upon an extraordinary, new-to-me author. That first book told the story of Xavier Bird and his life-long friend Elijah Whiskeyjack, as they struggled to survive WWI together. Through Black Spruce, winner of Canada’s 2008 Giller Prize, takes place decades later and tells the story of Xavier’s son, Will Bird, legendary Cree bush pilot. Will is lying comatose in a hospital. His granddaughter Annie sits by his side and the narrative is presented as alternating chapters, Will telling his story to Annie and Annie relating hers to her grandfather. Boyden chose joint narratives for his previous book too and this effective narration device made it possible for him to leave each chapter with somewhat of a cliffhanger that the reader has to wait for as he reads the other storyteller’s tale. Needless to say, this technique, coupled with brilliant writing made the book impossible to put down.Will and Annie’s stories are entirely different yet they share some common themes: growing up in virtual poverty and often being very hungry, the drug addiction and alcoholism prevalent on the “rez,” the desperate winter weather conditions common to Canada’s Arctic region where the stories take place and the loneliness and depression that is common, the danger of unsavory characters that plague any generation, and the importance of the love of friends and family. Will describes their hometown in this way:“Moosonee. End of the road. End of the tracks. I can sense it just beyond the trees, nieces. It’s not so far away through the heavy snow. That place, it can be a sad, greedy town. You fall into your group of friends, and that’s that. Friends for life, minus the times you are enemies. Not too many people around here to choose from for friends, or for enemies. So choose right. In this place, your people will die for you. Unless they’re mad at you. If you are on the outs with a friend, all bets are off. You don’t exist. I’m down to my last couple of friends and have been for years. Maybe it’s like anywhere, but we’re some vengeful bunch. I blame it on the Cree being a clan-based people. Each clan has its own interests in mind. And whenever you have your own best interests in mind, someone gets left out and angry.” (Page 11)Someone is angry at Will and someone is angry at Annie and that is what keeps the narrative moving. The way in which each of their stories is resolved is what keeps you on the edge of your seat. I’m hoping that Boyden is making a trilogy out of this. The silent Gordon and could easily go on to have a book of their own. I wonder what Mr. Boyden is writing right now. Very highly recommended.
    • 4/5
      Through black spruce by Joseph Boyden is a novel of love and loss and persistence set primarily in Ontario at the southern end of the James Bay.Though about half the narration takes place northern Ontario in their Cree community, and half in New York City, the taiga forest is obviously a well-loved home for both narrators. But this is not a novel full of action.What hooked me was the tone of the narrators, Will & Annie, reflective and measured, always reaching out to the other. The sentences are short, terse really, but clear and descriptive. Yet the picture is tantalizingly out of focus, and it takes quite awhile to put the pieces together, and even then there are things unfinished, unsaid, unresolved.The first chapter is clearly a man talking to his nieces, obviously in trouble and talking to help keep himself moving. But what kind of trouble isn’t clear. In trouble with alcohol? When the first paragraph of a novel is a description of what to blend with rye whiskey, you know alcohol plays an important role in the story. Alcohol plays a role through rest of the chapter, a description of Will’s first plane crash onto a partially frozen creek lined with black spruce, but not the only one. The other thing that plays a significant role in the story are his family and friends, particularly his nieces; the final paragraph of the chapter makes clear that getting back to them is keeping the narrator going:"The snow’s deep here, nieces. I’m tired, but I have to keep walking. I’m so tired, but I’ve got to get up or I’ll freeze to death. Talking to you, it keeps me warm."The second chapter introduces niece Annie, who lets us know her uncle is in the hospital, in intensive care and unconscious. Why isn’t clear until we’re a quite a way into the story. Annie has been away for a long time, out of communication with her uncle (and her mother). We learn eventually that she started out searching for her missing sister, and followed her trail to the glamorous life of a model, locating her sister’s “friends” and living the high in New York City, until Annie’s life there falls apart.Her friend Eva, a nurse at the hospital, encourages Annie to talk to her uncle. Her first attempt is awkward, and it’s clear she feels guilty, somehow responsible for his ending up here (It took me awhile after I finished the book to figure out why.) But Annie and Will have a bond because, as Annie says, speaking of her sister, “I bet you believe she’s still alive . . . Nobody else around here does but you and me, I bet.” The other bond they have is they both love living in the bush, hunting and trapping.The remainder of the book alternates back and forth between Will’s voice and Annie’s, and we are left to attempt to piece together the story of what happened to Suzanne and to Will. What happened to Suzanne? Is it possible that she will come back? And what about Will? What happened to him? Clearly he and his niece both desire his return to the land of the living. Will he make it?My public library does not have any of Boyden's other books, unfortunately, but I hope to read more of his writing.This novel won the Giller Prize in 2008.
    • 5/5
      To read Joseph Boyden’s Through Black Spruce is to peer through a window into a quintessentially Canadian, and poignantly Northern Ontarian world. The novel, which explores human descent into revenge, violence and brutality, illuminates the rich and often desperate lives of the Cree and Ojibwa nations who, against all predations, still pursue traditions and lifestyles that in the end are their salvation and legacy. The voice Boyden’s uses is stark, simple, elegantly First Nations, and because of that acts as a sharp foil to the darker, convoluted story that is told through the dual voices of Annie and Will Bird. Each of them attempt to rescue the other through their stories and through the raw honesty of their experiences. In some ways, the dual-narrative acts as confessional, so that the reader understands that beyond the sharp edges of their actions, and the crimes committed by and upon them, there is in fact the mitigating grey of justice no court of law can assess. Through all of this is a high-strung, fever pitch tension that nearly screams at you to flick to the next page and the next, so that you find yourself breathless and anxious, dare I say it, even obsessed by the haunting quality of this story. More than deserving of the Giller Prize, Through Black Spruce is an excellent read, and worthy of the investment of time and emotion.
    • 4/5
      I can't help but judge this book by comparison to [book:Three Day Road] by the same author, partly because I read them almost back to back. Three Day Road is better, in my opinion. There was more of a hypnotic quality about it that pulled me into its world and layers of story. Through Black Spruce is good, too, but maybe because it is contemporary, the hypnotic quality isn't there. There seemed to be more action to the story and less poetry, though the literary quality is still present. This one probably appeals more to the general public, but literary snobs will want to go with the debut novel instead. Either way, it's a good book.
    • 3/5
      THROUGH BLACK SPRUCE isn't the first book it's taken me quite a long time to read, it's not even the one that took the longest to read, but it did take many attempts before I was able to get any traction. This attempt I read the blurb first-up and did a little Google hunting - something I normally try not to do. But this time I really needed it to find out what on earth was going on. Then it dawned on me why I was having so much trouble getting into the book.THROUGH BLACK SPRUCE is a family story, told from two main points of view. Annie is the sister of the missing Suzanne, as per the blurb. She's the one who did come home, after a whirlwind time in the big cities which started off with her looking for Suzanne and ended up with her almost living Suzanne's life. The other main narrator is their Uncle Will, a man haunted by loss, old, looking back at his life and the disastrous outcomes surrounding the disappearance of Suzanne. The book launches into these individual voices very quickly, and there's no real hint at the start as to what the story is about, and where the reader is being taken. It's a controlled, contained, almost placid book to start off with, beautifully evocative of life in a harsh and difficult environment and the joys and tensions of living in a small community. It draws a series of wonderful, thoughtful, sometimes eccentric, often quite poignant characterisations. At no stage does THROUGH THE BLACK SPRUCE give anything unnecessary away. And that is why the book may have been so difficult to get any traction on. There is no indication at the start where this is going, even for a while who is narrating; what has happened; how anybody got to the position they are in, or even what exact position that is; where the story is leading. This is immersion reading, and in a way extreme faith reading. The reader has to simply give in to the author, allow this world and these people to slowly, very very slowly emerge, draw their pictures, cohere into a tale of violence and extremes, kindness, love and compassion. Once you do give in, allow this book to work it's way into it's own story and draw you into the world, it's often rather beautiful. Uncle Will is a marvellous old character, wise and stupid, kind, stubborn and game as. Annie is very much a survivor, whether that's in the modelling studios and parties of New York and Toronto or deep in the frozen forest in the hunting camps, setting traps and coaxing the old snowmobile into one more trip, she's strong and very very like her Uncle.THROUGH BLACK SPRUCE is not however, a perfect book. It's strengths are most definitely in Will's world, as he narrates his life, as he moves through the Canadian wilderness, as he goes backwards and forwards through his past and his present. Less convincing are the times that Annie spends away from forest, in the cities and the modelling life. This is more sketchy, flat and bland, hard to follow, less immersing. Because of that there's frequently a lack of balance in the narration. Will became a real focus, allowing the reader to understand and accept his connection to his home, the land and the creatures around him. There was less of that connection with Annie - maybe because of the Indian spiritualism which worked well for Will but didn't seem to have such authenticity in her city based world. Once she's back in the forest, at her Uncle's side, and once the events surrounding the disappearance of Suzanne start to clarify, Annie starts to make more sense. But it was hard to shake a slight suspicion of contrivance. But that's a minor quibble. Ultimately I really liked this book, once I'd figured out how to read it. It's probably not a book for a more traditional crime fiction fan - it's definitely about the journey and not the destination, but once into it, once I'd figured out who was who and that I wasn't supposed to have the slightest idea what was going on for most of the book, I just went with it. And along the way there were some glorious moments.
    • 5/5
      This book is a deserving winner of the prestigious Giller prize in 2008. I've been wanting to read it for some time, but wanted to read Boyden's first book "Three Day Road" first. As good as that book was, this one is even better. But it was good to read Three Day Road first as it is a precursor to this one and helped me understand the characters a bit more. Like Three Day Road, this book is so difficult to read in some ways because you keep waiting for the terrible, cataclysmic thing to happen. And even though you know it's going to happen, it doesn't make it any less terrible when it does. This book is also similar to Three Day Road as it told from the viewpoints of two different people. Both Will and his young niece Annie have terrible stories to tell and each heals through the sharing of them. I highly recommend this book, but I would suggest that you read Three Day Road first. You will feel richer from the experience of enjoying superlative story telling. Both books will take you up and out of your everyday life and into a magical world that seems so very real while you are there reading about it.
    • 4/5
      This book is a wonderful combination of Native traditional life in a modern Western world with all the pitfalls, challenges and rewards that stem from it. The focus, however, is on the people: never at one time did I think - this is a book about drugs, alcohol, traditional lifestyles. Rather, it is a loving and intricate look at humans and their relationship with each other and their surroundings. Brilliantly crafted and compelling all the way through, it is an insightful and touching look at the North.
    • 4/5
      An excellent book, told from the POV of two First Nations characters, Annie Bird and her uncle Will Bird, who is in a coma. The serious nature of their one-way conversations with each other is punctuated by moments of hilarity and the firm bond of family and culture is strong throughout.
    • 4/5
      Another well written book by Joseph Boyden
    • 5/5
      I half-wondered if Boyden's second novel would engage me as his first, Three Day Road, did or whether it would turn out to be a case of a wistful "Oh well!" for another author lacking staying power. It was the former; I didn't want to put the book down.Like his first novel, this is told by alternating narrators. The first is Will Bird, a well-known Cree bush pilot, who lies, comatose, in the hospital while his thoughts spin out the tale of how he got there. The second is his niece, Annie Bird, who has returned to Moosonee to sit with her uncle because her friend, a nurse, has told her that talking with a patient may help to rouse him. While sitting there, she tells him the story of her search for her missing sister, who went south to Montreal and New York to be a model. Eventually, you start to see the two threads merge naturally into a single story that's exciting and tense. This book has the same clean writing style that I admired so much in both his first novel and his collection of short stories, Born With a Tooth. It's fluid, quick and compelling, and takes you right into the First Nation communities around Moosonee, or out into the frozen bush on the borders of Hudson Bay. He has also crafted another set of vivid and complex characters that engaged me from the opening pages.Though this book won Canada's top prize for fiction, I still rank his first novel ahead of it. Will's story line is gripping and forceful—there wasn't a chance I was going to set the book down while in the midst his chapters. Some of Annie's tale, however, is a bit more prosaic. Though the portions of her story set at home drew me right in, when she recounts her sojourn in the drug-fueled lifestyle of the glitterati, there's a bit of dullness to the story...almost as if the superficiality of that life had colored the writing. I wanted those parts of the book over so I could get back to the North. I also found a faint hint of blockbuster in the ending as, after a climactic scene, everything begins to wrap up tidily. But...don't interpret this as damning—I was delighted with this story and have added Boyden to my Favorite Authors list.By the way, if the characters' surname sounds familiar to those who have read Three Day Road, Will and Annie are Xavier Bird's son and granddaughter. Since he has stated he will always write about the First Nations, I'm hoping there will be more stories about the inhabitants of Moosonee and Moose Factory.
    • 4/5
      CrossroadsThe best way to describe this book is that it is fundamentally about people at the crossroads -- between the traditional and the modern, good and evil, young and old. The novel is a slightly complicated read since Boyden uses a double monologue of both his protagonists Will and Annie. Although slightly distracting at first, both narratives intersect together nicely so it isn't all that difficult to follow.Boyden is a great storyteller there is no doubt about that. I would have appreciated slightly more lyricism in his writing though which at times feels a little mechanical -- for such a great story, it lacks that literary touch. The characters are rich and complex and Boyden does a great job to explore their inner feelings.Overall, I highly recommend "Through Black Spruce" -- it is well-deserving of the Giller Prize. I would call it a Canadian classic, but definitely a true gem.