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West of Here - Jonathan Evison
West of Here
by: (author)
A century after the late–19th-century settlers of Olympic Peninsula to the west of Seattle set out to build a dam, their descendants want to demolish it to bring back fish runs, providing one of the many plots in this satisfyingly meaty work from Evison (All About Lulu). The scenes of the early... show more
A century after the late–19th-century settlers of Olympic Peninsula to the west of Seattle set out to build a dam, their descendants want to demolish it to bring back fish runs, providing one of the many plots in this satisfyingly meaty work from Evison (All About Lulu). The scenes of the early settlers track an expedition into the Olympic wilderness and the evolving relations between settlers and the Klallam tribe, provide insights into early feminism, and outline an entrepreneur's dream to build the all-important dam. By comparison, the contemporary stories are chock-full of modern woe and malaise, including a Bigfoot watcher and seafood plant worker who wishes to relive his glory days as a high school basketball star; an ex-convict who sets out into the wilderness to live off the land; and an environmental scientist who is hit with an unexpected development. Evison does a terrific job at creating a sense of place as he skips back and forth across the century, cutting between short chapters to sustain a propulsive momentum while juggling a sprawling network of plots and a massive cast of characters real enough to walk off the page. A big novel about the discovery and rediscovery of nature, starting over, and the sometimes piercing reverberations of history, this is a damn fine book.  

źródło opisu: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004HW7MZI/ref=kinw_myk_ro_title
źródło okładki: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004HW7MZI/ref=kinw_myk_ro_title
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Format: ebook
ISBN: 1565129520
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Pages no: 496
Edition language: English
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Community Reviews
thomcat
thomcat rated it
Too many characters to follow. I get the gist - a major event near the beginnings of the town, and the later effects - but it is told in the first person by far too many people. Concentrating on a few key people would be better, or even just telling the story from the perspective of the town. Also, ...
javajunco
javajunco rated it
5.0 West of Here
For a novel about conquering the frontier, West of Here is refreshingly free of frontier wisdom. In fact it's also wonderfully free of platitudes of any kind, which is incredibly rare in a novel of it's scope. As someone familiar with the area in which the story takes place, I was impressed by how w...
misfitandmom
misfitandmom rated it
Eh, this just wasn't for me.
Another fine mess
Another fine mess rated it
3.0
Recommended. Many will like this more than me, and I think most will like it, period.Often funny, often moving, often gripping . . . but a little bit marred by a lack of strong momentum. There's much that impresses -- a deliberately-ornate architecture (shifting time periods smoothly, but also jug...
miscellaneous debris
miscellaneous debris rated it
4.0 West of Here
A Yarn-spinner extraordinaire brings us a novel rich in detail and teeming with life. Two parallel stories converge in a small town across a century, populated by characters that are familiar yet unique. Evison has an uncanny ability to bring his characters to life with just a few sentences.
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