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The Raven's Gift (2013)

by Don Rearden(Favorite Author)

3.9 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

014318749X (ISBN13: 9780143187493)

languge

English

genre

Science Fiction

publisher

Pintail

review 1: Warning-- If you're currently freaking out about the Ebola issue, you might want to skip this one for a while. This is set in very rural Alaska, and details a man's struggle to survive after disease runs rampant and society falls apart. It's almost like a zombie novel with no zombies (that's not a bad thing). It's a bit chilling at times, and has a lot of ugly details.Overall, I liked it. It's tautly written, good tension, and I feel bad for John, the main character, whose life keeps getting worse throughout the story. There are some great details and good scenes in here.Positives said, there were a few things I didn't care for.The book jumps between (I think) 3 time frames, and keeping track was occasionally difficult. They weren't wonderfully well differentiated at ... moretimes.The author cares very deeply about the Native Alaskans. This comes through very clearly, and he's passionate about it. That's wonderful, but there are a few moments when a few of the characters jump up on their soap boxes a bit too much. Don't let any of that dissuade you from reading this. It's a powerful story, and well worth the time. It really impressed me.
review 2: It's always a big plus for me to be transported to a new and different setting while reading. I'd never read anything about the Alaskan bush before, and so "The Raven's Gift" was a great introduction. Now I'll have to take a look at Jon Krakauer's "Into the Wild", but Don Rearden aimed at something quite different from Krakauer. It's plain to see, as Rearden notes at the beginning, what a profound influence this wilderness is on his writing. But when you get to his afterword, you'll understand even more about how deeply he cares for Yup'ik cultural history. That's another of this book's great strengths.Rearden took a gamble with the multi-tracked narrative structure...but he's got the literary chops to pull it off. He builds palpable tension and the momentum gathers, especially in the last quarter of the story.His cast of characters is also well developed, but there were two real show-stealers for me: Alex and Red. less

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