Becky's Books –

This was a selection of the BookiesII reading group –  a question was asked about which book do you really wish you could read again for the first time and the name of the book under consideration came up.  With those two prompts I decided to go ahead –  I’d been reluctant prior.   I probably should have followed my own instincts,  but I got involved in the smarmy stuff anyway.   lol

In  my defense I did read some about it and the descriptors on the Goodreads page say historical fiction, fiction, culture > Japan, Historical,  Cultural > Asia, War, WWII.  That’s it –  no “romance.”

*******
A Dictionary of Mutual Understanding
by Jackie Copleton
2016 / 292 pages
read by Nancy Wu – 11h 9m
rating:  4  / historical fiction – romance (imo)
*******

The story opens in a US city of the 1980s where Amaterasu Takahash,  an old woman of Japanese ancestry,  is visited by someone who says he’s her grandson.   The story then quickly steps back via a diary and letters which the grandson has delivered to her.  The woman also delves into her own memories of her daughter as well as her own life.  The diary and letters involve illicit love and parental disapproval in the days of  World War II.    Amaterasu and her husband, Kenzo,  had fled Japan after the bombing of Nagasaki thinking their daughter and her son were surely dead.

As the narrative moves along various informational sections appear which reveal some history and cultural background.  But the main story is not how those things came to be – but rather how historical they are.  The main story is how a teenage Japanese girl is romantically involved with an older married man and the repercussions on her whole life as well as the life of her parents.  The plot is completely predictable,  the language

Much of the history presented is so surface as to be irrelevant – the  Portuguese visited, traded and built there in the 16th century and the the Edo period was primarily it the 18th century when the cult of the Samurai pretty much ended.   These were  NOT the grandparents of the people involved in WWII Japan. But I think Copleton is trying to connect the ancient and historical Japan to the difficulties of more contemporary times – There’s about as much connection as King Arthur to Margaret Thatcher (1980s) so imo, it’s a literary device used very clumsily (not saying it couldn’t be done).

I suppose the themes would be family secrets and loyalty along with love of many kinds  and loss, maybe memory and the ravages of war.  Unfortunately the soft, slow,  wispy voice of Nancy Wu, the reader,  adds nothing to the tale.

If you want Japanese historical fiction try “The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet” by David Mitchell,  “Shogun” by James Clavell,  “An Artist of the Floating World” by Kazuo Ishiguro or many others  –  Even “The Narrow Road to the Deep North”  by Richard Flannagan has a lot about Japan during WWII than this one.

** Reminder to self – NO MAS  historical romance – trust your instincts if the tag does not say romance specifically – do a bit more research.  LOL!**

Lots of hype for this one – the author has lots of friends in high places.  But that doesn’t mean it’s not good.  It is quite good or at least I should say I enjoyed it.  That said, it may not be everyone’s cuppa.

The plot premise is that a private jet crashes off Martha’s Vineyard and two people survive,  the protagonist (the most riveting of the later stories)  Scott Burroughs, a middle-aged painter,  and a 4-year old boy,  JJ Bateman.  That’s just the Prologue.   The other passengers were rich and powerful men and their families plus the crew.  How could this happen?

*******
Before the Fall 
by Noah Hawley
2016 / 391 pages
read by Robert Petcoff – 12h 59m
Rating:  B+ / literary crime-suspense 
*******

The novel is structured around parallel threads  each one developing a character on board the jet,  their difficulties, their lives.  The suspense is built that way because the reader is thinking “could this person have caused the crash?”  There are no metal detectors on most private jets.

But along the way Hawley asks more literary questions about life and coincidences  and reality and these questions develop into themes.  Sad to say this meandering around takes the tension out of the suspense and it’s never terribly insightful – although there were a couple of very, very nice lines.  There’s another theme or sub-theme on the reality issue – what part does the media play in our lives –

But the best part of the novel is the relationship between Scott and JJ – that is simply wonderful in concept and execution – breathed all the life into the novel anyone could want.

And Bobby Dylan won the Nobel Prize on Tuesday “…for,”  according to the Swedish Academy, “having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.” https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2016/  – it was in the category of poetry, songwriting.

Did he do that? – You betcha! I’m a true child of the ’60s/’70s. I don’t know when I first heard Dylan’s name, probably along with that of Joan Baez,  sometime in my freshman year of high school –  1963 -’64,  about the same time as I first heard the Beatles who quickly took the place of the Beach Boys and the Supremes in my heart.

His “poetry, songwriting”?
From THE TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGIN‘
“And you better start swimming or you’ll sink like a stone. Oh, the times, they are a-changin’.”

And from A HARD RAIN’S A-GONNA FALL
“And I’ll tell it and speak it and think it and breathe it.”

No his voice and musical abilities are within normal range. But there was something about Dylan’s lyrics which spoke to a whole generation and ,  together with the gravelly  voice and musical composition,  changed us,  bonded us,  branded us maybe even.

I know there is some dismay among the more “literary minded”  about the choice but I think that’s been true of almost every nomination since probably Toni Morrison (1993) –  The claims of “there are others so much better!”  and “a playwright?”  “a poet/translator?”     are ongoing.

*** Too bad –   Rabindranath Tagore, a novelist and lyricist from India, won the  Nobel in 1913.  http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1913/tagore-bio.html

Also see The Conversation site for more info.

In my opinion,  and I’ve watched the Nobel Prizes for many years,  there is a part of the award which is political.  Rather than simply to the best novelist or poet,  in the 21st century (since Gunter Grass won it in 1999 – and that had its own political repercussions)  the award has tended to go to writers who have had to struggle to be heard because of the themes of the writing or the country they wrote in – sometimes for the impact they had on society or literature.   The honor is not going to go to highly popular writers in basically free speech countries no matter how wonderfully well they write about middle-of-the-road topics.

I believe Dylan’s lyrics have been taught in high school and college literary classes.  Songwriting is a form of literary expression (I believe Homer’s works were sung)  and now it’s been recognized again.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/arts/music/bob-dylan-nobel-prize-literature.html?_r=0

Ahhh…. the 19th book in the Ladies #1 Detective Agency series was released on Tuesday so I promptly finished Dawn Patrol  (Don Winslow) and downloaded the new one on early the 12th  and began listening to Lisette Lecat, the regular narrator,  reading away.    I read these for the characters,  not the very light-weigth crime plots although those are nice.  These books are the cozies of cozies for me and I’ve been following the series since 1998,  the first book.   (Note – they absolutely MUST be read in order.)

I’ve read (listened to) a few of Don Winslow’s books over the years,  staring with
“A Cool Breeze on the Underground” (1991),  and have generally been entertained – they’re kind of fun except for The Cartel which is just flat amazing –  a literary thriller of a very intense sort.  Dawn Patrol was on sale and so I took a shot.

*******
Dawn Patrol
by Don Winslow
2008 / 320 pages
read by Ray Porter – 9h 37m
Rating :    B-   crime
(#1 in the Boone Daniels series of 2 books)
*******

It took me  awhile to get into this book – several reasons –  the setting is Pacific Beach, a San Diego area community where surfing has been a huge draw for generations.  Boone Daniels is a committed surfer and part-time private detective with a number of colorful friends and associates.    One day  a gorgeous attorney named Petra Hall shows up to hire Boone to locate a certain stripper who has disappeared under mysterious circumstances involving arson.

Meanwhile,  a woman later assumed to be the stripper Boone and Petra are seeking has been thrown off a balcony of a nearby motel – this is the Prologue – in what looks like a suicide but possibly a murder.   Petra and Boone know this is not their stripper but if the cops want to believe it is well …

The story  eventually gets to some good suspense with it’s attention grabbing Prologue,  colorful but essentially  violent characters,  very short chapters with frequent cliff-hanger endings as well as alternating scenarios and points of view and a nicely twisted plot.  But the background stories on various characters and the history of the setting undercuts the suspense and the story drags a bit – there’s also a huge element of comic dialogue and other antics so the suspense may not be entirely the point.  But it’s a hugely atmospheric crime novel  and succeeds in that,  with me anyway – a California girl (who managed to surf one time).

So yes,  it’s entertaining in its own way and it may actually be a love letter to the California  surfing culture.  Highway One is the Highway to Heaven?  –

Highly recommended if you’re interested in the history of Rome (750 BC to 212AD) as an an old history buff or if you never did get around to this era.  It’s a good, good book.

It took some time to finish but well worth it as it’s something I’ve needed to fill a gap in my knowledge base  – and it is way, way more than that.   It’s an update on the old high school chapter on “The Grandeur that was Rome.”     As much as I’ve studied history of all sorts of eras and places,  the history of Rome,  on its own,  has escaped me.  I thought it was too militaristic,  too boring,  too complicated,  etc.  Still,  I got quite a lot anyway,  reading Rubicon by  Tom Holland and a couple biographies of Cleopatra.  I’m fascinated by the Roman presence in the British Isles,  Spain, the Middle East and so on.  But I’ve not touched Roman history specifically since high school.

*******
SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome
by Mary Beard
2016 / 537 pages (kindle – narrative only)
rating:  9.5 
read by Phyllida Nash -18h 30m
*******

Beard is a scholar of Roman history and teaches at the University of Cambridge, a fellow of Newnham College, and Royal Academy of Arts Professor of ancient literature.  So she knows whereof she speaks.  She also writes quite nicely.

So what’s new in the study of Ancient Rome? –  First I personally had better get caught up on the old stuff.  That’s okay because both the traditional information as well as the recent material is covered.  I had to stretch my memory and Google a few times to get some background,  but mostly I did okay if I paid attention. There’s a great timeline at the end of the book!

This is a fairly detailed study so even at 537 text pages,   it only goes from  about 700 BC to 212 AD with the basics as well as  even the name of Rome’s first public librarian is mentioned.  But it’s also broad with nice analyses.  SPQR are the initials of  “The Senate and People of Rome” which is used quite often in old Roman documents.

Although the book opens with Cicero and Catiline of the 1st century AD the story is generally told in chronological order from about 700 BC and the tribes of Italy with Romulus and Remus,  through the Kings  and the beginning of written law and the Senate,  after which comes the Republic with Consuls and more extensive voting privileges ending up with the early times of Empire.

The chapter titles give a huge clue as to the scope of the book.   Good maps and wonderful illustrations are also included.  There’s not much of in the way of source notes but that would really be too cumbersome – there is a good “Further Reading” section.

Prologue:  The History of Rome –

1. Cicero’s Finest Hour

2. In the Beginning

3. The Kings of Rome

4. Rome’s Great Leap Forward

5. A Wider World

6. New Politics

7. From Empire to Emperors

8. The Home Front

9. The Transformations of Augustus

10. Fourteen Emperors

11. The Haves and Have-Nots

12. Rome Outside Rome

Epilogue: The First Roman Millennium

There is quite a lot of political and military history here as is to be expected but Beard has inserted the social and cultural aspects as available,  primarily after Chapter 7.  The focus seems to be on the changes and system(s).

I’m amazed at how much like current times it was in those early days of any kind of “freedom” or “democracy.”  –  But as Beard states in the Epilogue,  we can’t really  directly “learn” all that much “from” the Romans as we can by “engaging with” the history.

Reviews:
The Atlantic –    The Secret of Rome’s Success
Mary Beard’s sweeping history is a new read of citizenship in the ancient empire.

The Economist –  What a strange lot
The Romans were funny, ambitious and cruel

The New York Review of Book – Inside the Emperors’  Clothes

I’m not sure what to think –  it’s a powerful book,  based on a historical event but not something which would be written this way today.

Set in the final years of the Romanov Dynasty, 1905 – 1913,  Malamud has presented a fictionalized version of the  historical case of Menahem Beilis –  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendel Beiles 

*******
The Fixer
by Bernard Malamud
1966 / 301 pages
rating:   8
*******

With quite a lot of very real troubles,  Revolution,  war with Japan,  agriculture,  the  Russian people and the regime of  Tsar Nicholas II turned against the Jews.

Yakov Bok, a general handyman (a “fixer”) is arrested and jailed for the Passover murder of a teenage boy – it’s about Blood Libel  –  Over the course of the book he is tortured, beaten, starved, sleep deprived etc. in order to make him confess.  (And that’s as far as that goes without spoilers.)

The book won the Pulitzer Prize in 1966 but I don’t know if I’m all that taken with it – and I don’t quite see how it fits the Americana idea behind the Pulitzers (but that’s changed and there are lots of Jewish people in the US).

The one thing it has going for it is the history behind the fiction,  but still – considering how much Malamud changed from the Beilis memoir re the family,   who knows how much he might have changed re the imprisonment.   Beilis’ family took Malmud to task for both plagiarism and defamation (I suppose you might call it).

“As the historian Albert Lindemann lamented, ‘By the late twentieth century, memory of the Beilis case came to be inextricably fused (and confused) with… The Fixer.’”[17]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menahem_Mendel_Beilis#Controversy_over_depiction_in_The_Fixer

Bingo!!

Still,  Malamud is a great author – I’ve read The Assistant and probably something else – he keeps the tension up and the ideas flowing.   Adding Spinoza and the New Testament were rather original and the way Bok ended up with the kind of seriously  delusional thinking one might expect after a couple years in that kind of imprisonment and torture was well done.   A couple of good plot twists, too.

I guess I’m following this series but it’s taken a turn for the mediocre.  I loved the financial shenanigans the protagonist,  Jason Stafford,  sorted out and I truly enjoyed the character of Jason’s young autistic son and Jason’s troubles with him.   Good thing the child is still around because ever since the first couple books in the series (and this is only #4) the financial aspects have shriveled.

I’m not sure what to think –  it’s a powerful book,  based on a historical event but not something which would be written this way today – I don’t think – it’s pretty heavy handed although maybe considering the subject matter, it needs to be.  .

Set in the final years of the Romanov Dynasty, 1905 – 1913,  Malamud has presented a fictionalized version of the  historical case of Menahem Beilis –  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendel Beiles 

*******
The Fixer
by Bernard Malamud
1966 / 301 pages
rating – 8
*******

With quite a lot of very real troubles,  Revolution,  war with Japan,  agriculture,  a viable heir to the throne,  the  Russian people and the regime of  Tsar Nicholas II turned against the Jews

Yakov Bok, a general handyman (a “fixer”) is arrested and jailed for the Passover murder of a teenage boy – it’s about Blood Libel  –  Over the course of the book he is tortured, beaten, starved, sleep deprived, kept in solitary confinement,  etc. in order to make him confess.  (And that’s as far as that goes without spoilers.)

The book won the Pulitzer Prize in 1966 but I don’t know if I’m all that taken with it – what else was published that year that might have been deserving? –

The one thing it has going for it is the history behind the fiction however,  considering how much Malamud changed from the Beilis memoir in terms of Yakov Bok and his family,   who knows how much he might have changed re the imprisonment.   Beilis’ family took Malmud to task for both plagiarism and defamation (I suppose you might call it).

“As the historian Albert Lindemann lamented, ‘By the late twentieth century, memory of the Beilis case came to be inextricably fused (and confused) with… The Fixer.’”^{[17]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menahem_Mendel_Beilis#Controversy_over_depiction_in_The_Fixer}

Bingo!!

Still,  Malamud is a great author – I’ve read The Assistant and probably something else – he keeps the tension up and the ideas flowing.   Adding Spinoza and the New Testament was rather original and the way Bok ended up with the kind of seriously  delusional thinking one might expect after a couple years in that kind of imprisonment and torture was well done.   A couple of good plot twists, too.

I’ll admit I’m a big fan of Monica Ferris’ Needlecraft series.   Oh I know it’s pure comfort reading,  cozy / traditional mystery series with an amateur detective and her friends sleuthing around a small town which is full of murders – heh.   This is the 19th in the series so I’ll expect one more book – it’s just the way these things go.   I’ve read all of them but I started in the middle (#8  Crewel Yule for a Christmas book challenge) and enjoyed that one,   so I  went back to #1 and read forward.)

Knit Your Own Murder
(#19 in the Needlecraft series)
by Monica Ferris
2016/ 304 pages
read by Susan Boyle  (A+)
rating – A / cozy mystery

In book 1  Betsy Devonshire inherited a little needlecraft shop from her sister (who was murdered it turns out)  in Excelsior Minnesota,  right outside Minneapolis.  Moving there from California she essentially started with nothing but over the years she has built the business and a group of friends in the town and this makes for a really nice reading.  I recommend the series be read in order although they’re not hopeless as stand-alones – the mysteries themselves are the focus.

This time Betsy’s little Monday Bunch of knitters is holding an auction and one of their members dies there almost on stage.  There’s another murder and the two are connected by business associations.  Betsy works through the complexities and with the local police to figure it out and find the killer  It’s not the best of the series (I guessed the ending) but it’s fun and I still look forward to the next one.

Finished a few days ago and am finally writing it down –   I’m not a huge Dickens fan but I’ve enjoyed many of his books over the years  – they’re kind of fun when I’m in the mood and actually quite interesting as historical artifacts in that they tell us 21st century readers quite a lot about life in the times of the great Boz.   I read Domby & Son for a college course in the History of 19th century England – good stuff.  And I did a fairly intense study of A Tale of Two Cities with GoodReads several years ago.   I’ve read most of his other novels between times – not all, though.

*******
Hard TImes
by Charles Dickens
1854 / 200 pages  (it varies)
rating – 8.5
*******

Hard Times has more social and economic material than most of his other works -than any of his other works I might say and it’s shorter, too.   The first three or four chapters set up the times in terms of his themes from Dickens’ point of view – the socio-economic problems,  education, child-raising,  the environment and mostly the clash of business interests versus the poor.   The story line commences from there with an occasional interruption for the narrator’s comments.

The novel is set in Coketown,  a small industrial town  somewhere in central England where Tom Gradgrind owns and operates the school and runs for Parliament.  Gradgrind is the ultimate utilitarian (although the term is never used) and conducts the school and raises his children by the “facts” only method – no room for “wonder.”   He has five children but only the eldest,  Tom and Louisa, and their lives are featured.    Josiah Boundarby is the rich factory owner and banker who sees things much as Gradgrind does.
Mrs Sparsit is a widow of diminished means who depends on  Boundarby for her living expenses.  Then there’s Stephen Blackpool   and Rachael, very poor workers at the plant which is trying to unionize and James Harthouse who comes to town seeking his fortune.  THere are other characters associated with a circus which comes to town – Sissy Jupe, the child of one of the performers becomes quite involved in the plot as a whole.

The plot itself is a bit twisted like a good Dickens novel should be,  but the focus and denouement tends to be on the theme or satire if you will,  against utilitarianism.

I enjoyed the book quite a lot, but Bleak House remains my all time favorite with A Tale of Two Cities second.

Um…. I read this all the way through 2 times now.  I upped the rating half a point the second time for literary value but …  they’re not today’s values.   Back in 1970 post-modern lit was all the rage like wearing hippie clothes and smoking on airplanes.  This book feels a lot like that and the movie even more so.

*******
The Driver’s Seat
by Muriel Spark
1970 / 107 pages
rating 8.5 /  classic literary crime –   
******* 

It’s basically a who-done-it, then it turns into a why-done-it  and concludes with a who-done-it again.   It comes complete with enough red-herrings to make dinner.  On a more literary level there’s  a lot of  self-reflexive stuff for a side course with patterns and symbolism for desert –  I even had left-overs what with the religious undertones  – (groan).

And there is too much coincidence and a couple of glaring omissions which aren’t quite covered up with the abundance of repetition and an obsessive compulsive disorder plus a problem with motivation.  (“Why-done-it?”)  You see this stuff for what it is on a second reading – most of it anyway.  Bottom line,  it’s not really satisfying because there’s too much literary fluffing for the meat.

On the good side,  the foreshadowing that our protagonist will be murdered (not a spoiler at all)  is worked into a really interesting structure creating  a great deal of tension.

I liked it kinda-sorta – but I don’t think it’s for today’s crime reader – times have changed in fiction as well as in fashion.    Making the real sense of it is tough going –  even the title is edgy and fraught with possible meanings.  It’s ambiguous and dark with a surprise ending – the first time round anyway.

I’ve only read one prior book by Laura Lippman and I didn’t much care for it –   see Baltimore Blues – rating C-.    But the 4-Mystry-Addicts group decided to read this one and it did have good reviews.  Besides, it’s a stand-alone,  so I went ahead and tried it.  That was not my best move.

*******
Wilde Lake 
Laura Lippman 
2016/368 pages
Rating   C  / crime 
*******

Louise (Lu) Brandt is the ambitious and perfectionist new state’s attorney for Howard County,  Maryland.  She is also the  widow of a very prominent venture capitalist and has two young children, twins,  to care for.  She currently lives in her father’s house – he was state’s attorney prior to retirement.  Her elder brother,  AJ,  is a prominent attorney in his own right.

Told in alternating sections of 1st and 3rd person from the protagonist’s point of view,  the narrative sometimes gets a bit uneven and in my opinion draws too much  attention away from the main plot.  It’s function is mainly  character development –  how did Lu get to be the way she is –  and that slows down the story considerably.    On the other hand,  the 1st person is the adult Lu remembering her life as a child – the motherless daughter of a very competitive father and brilliant older brother living in the town in which they grew up,  have old friends and back-stories.

In the present day Lu has a pending murder case which brings up old memories.  She also has her father and brother and children to deal with.   The pathetic young man who has been charged with the murder has a history with Lu and her brotheer as well as some psychological issues. There are other problems with the case,   but Lu is determined to convict him of 1st degree murder.

The youthful Lu has to deal with teenage sex,  racial differences,  her famous father and super-popular brother,  being motherless and more.   There’s too much of this background  business for a crime novel.  It’s well done but really takes most of the tension away from the main plot.

I’ve read several of Muriel Sparks’ novels but never anything like this one.  It’s called a “psychological thriller”  but imo,  it’s really just plain weird.   That said,  I understand that it takes more than one reading to get to different levels so … I might.  It’s nicely written and I  enjoy what I’ve read of Spark’s prior books,  the protagonist is interesting –   etc.   And it was nominated for that “Lost Booker” prize of 1970 (awarded in 2010).

******
The Driver’s Seat 
by Muriel Spark 
1970 / 101 pages
rating –  8
*******

Lise is a woman in early middle age who one day walks out of her office,  buys some very bright and odd clothes and takes a trip to Italy.   On the flight she acts odd,  apparently trying to pick up men.

In Italy she pairs up with a little old lady and they go shopping for awhile.  Lise is looking for someone – a man she calls her date.

By the beginning of Chapter 3 (page 25)  we know Lise is going to be found the next day,  dead in a park,  murdered.  There is some very deft foreshadowing which pops up a few times in the narrative – to the point the story is almost occurring in two time frames – one follows her on the day she’s murdered,  the other briefly accounts for the resulting action on the day her body is found.

Knowing that but not knowing who or why the reader follows Lise’s as she wanders the city meeting people and getting in little scrapes.  A number of possibilities present themselves and our protagonist-victim seems to be setting something up –

If you like big fat books of historical fiction,  generational sagas if you will,  this is this  year’s  book for you.  It’s the kind of book I can just escape into for hours – the story keeps going – and going – and going – for over 300 years and thousands and thousands of miles -the entire world as it turns out.

*******
Barkskins 
by Annie Proulx
2016/ 736 pages
rating:  9.25  /  historical fiction 
*******

I suppose this is what I expected having read “The Shipping News”  years ago and very much enjoying it.   But Proulx is 80 now and not the most prolific writer on the block.   It’s a treat getting to read a new one.

The setting is basically the forests around southeastern Canada and Maine, especially the Penobscot and Boston areas and up into what is now Canada.  But there are also scenes in many other places because some of the characters travel  as far as London, Amsterdam, China and New Zealand and Ecuador.   The hundreds of characters include Natives,  immigrants,  colonists, Americans,  as well as a few Europeans and others.  Yes,  there are nice graphic family trees in the back pages but I really hesitated to look at them much for fear of accidental spoilers – like who marries whom?  I did check them out lightly a couple times though – they were helpful.

A saga like this requires much of the tale be related in “telling” rather than “showing”  mode,  but there is some nicely done “showing” involved as well.  And “telling” has its place when events transpire over the course of years and years.

The setting is small to start but widens as the years go by.   It’s infinitely more substantial than a “background”  as it is the forests themselves  which produce the actions and responses of the human characters.  The forests of the world may be a kind of setting as character? –  Can all those forests be “a” character – how about several or many characters?  I don’t know.  but in some ways decidedly yes,  in other ways definitely no.   lol –  They can certainly be discussed as though they were characters –

The story opens in 1693 in a forest upstream from a remote riverbank settlement in what is now the southeast corner of the Province of Quebec.   Two men, René Sel and Charles Duquet, start cutting the trees on a piece of land which their master,  Monsieur Trepagny, has purchased from the Mi’kmaqs.  A woman named Mari tends a cottage there and watches her several French-named children.   So begins the fortunes and misfortunes of two families, that of  Rene Sel (who marries Mari) and Charles Duquet who returns to Europe for a woman with property.  One famiy is basically of Mi’kmaq heritage while the other is more French or Dutch,  perhaps English.

It’s a powerful tale and nicely told with the history being gently infused without ever taking over –  the details about the Mi’kmaq people is perfect.  Proulx certainly does her research.    Unfortunately,  imo,   toward the end of this 700+ pages book,  the politics of conservation/environmental issues becomes a bit heavy-handed –  I’m certainly of similar mind but not crazy about being hit over the head with the details.

These pages are full of pictures and other details re Mi’kmaq life:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mi%27kmaq

http://www.micmac-nsn.gov
http://www.heritage.nf.ca/articles/aboriginal/mikmaq-history.php

Nice Interview:  1465321447
http://www.wsj.com/articles/barkskins-author-annie-proulx-is-restless-in-seattle-

Some great reviews:
NY Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/19/books/review/barkskins-by-annie-proulx.html?_r=0

Minneapolis Star Tribune:
http://www.startribune.com/review-barkskins-by-annie-proulx-covers-300-years-of-evolving-environmental-values/382703771/