Words Jackie LaPlante
In the sea of perfectly good novels that I wade into each month, it was delightful to find a book that was a joy in every way. Chock-full of fascinating characters and varied narrative methods, the beautifully-crafted North Woods, is absolutely worth the read.
Written by physician, professor of psychology and award-winning novelist Daniel Mason, the novel samples multiple genres and points of view, using voices ranging from centuries-old ghosts to crime noir patter. Mason intersperses chapters with historical documentation and folksy ballads to create a beautiful, compelling observation of a region’s adaptation to the forces of nature and time.
A piece of land in Massachusetts plays host to a yellow clapboard house for nearly three centuries. As unconnected families come and go, outside forces, both of nature and culture, have their way with the house and surrounding land. The house is enlarged, the flora alters, the climate changes and the land remains a constant witness to the alterations made by time.
An adulterous Puritan couple fleeing the strictures of their colony are the first on the land. A widowed father parlays a single apple tree into a successful orchard, documenting his story in a letter to his children. The diction changes as a pastoralist landscape painter writes daily letters of unrequited love to his best friend. Terse medical case notes portray a young man whose very deep relationship with the land is mistaken for madness, and a self-important historian is characterized only through the address he is preparing for a meeting. Between these short stories are snippets from the point of view of local animals; anecdotal descriptions of how chestnut spore blight and Dutch elm disease were brought to and changed the area, and a beautifully amusing chapter depicting the sexual act of beetles. Every chapter offers a new literary flavour, connected in theme by subtle historical clues.
Add to this abundance botanical illustrations, folk ballads, tales of the catamount (a local panther) and pages from historical almanacs. What seems like a mélange of sources and stories is beautifully tied together by Daniel Mason’s well-executed prose and thoughtful descriptions of nature, making North Woods a compelling and cohesive book.
Novels that take the reader on a wild ride can be awe-inspiring in their creativity. From the historical range of Cloud Atlas to the multiple viewpoints of Trust and the ghost narrators of the bardo, these novels are entertaining and apt demonstrations of their authors’ skill.
1. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
2. Trust by Hernan Diaz
3. Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
