In telling a story of the fictional A'atsika, a Native people of the American West Coast who find their mythical origins in the whale and the octopus, Hogan (Mean Spirit ) employs just the right touch of spiritualism in this engrossing tale. When Thomas Witka Just succumbs to peer pressure and joins the army, then is sent to Vietnam, Ruth Small is pregnant with his child. In an attempt to prevent an atrocity, Thomas kills fellow soldiers and deserts, ultimately blending into the Vietnamese culture and fathering a child, Lin, by Ma, a village girl. In the meantime, Ruth gives birth to their son, Marco Polo, who is said to have the same mystical whaling powers of Thomas's grandfather. Years later, following Thomas's return, Dwight, a ne'er-do-well friend of Thomas's, arranges for the tribe to kill a whale and to sell the meat to the Japanese, a plan that will draw in Marco Polo and set up a confrontation between the whole ensemble. Despite the plot's multiple strands, the story flows smoothly, and Hogan comes up with a powerful, romantic crescendo. (Aug.)
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In this latest novel from American Book Award® winner and Pulitzer® Prize finalist Hogan (Mean Spirit ), a young man returns to his seaside Native American village after the Vietnam War to find his tribe in conflict over the decision to hunt a whale. Hogan's combination of mythic and realistic elements results in a spiritual listening experience, while Audie® Award-winning narrator Stefan Rudnicki's perfectly paced and sonorous diction adds just the right weight. Recommended for public libraries with a demand for Hogan's earlier works. [Audio clip available through www.blackstoneaudio.com .-Ed.]
The latest from Pulitzer Prize finalist Hogan (English/Univ. of Colorado; Power, 1998, etc.) revolves around two Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest as they struggle to reconcile the tribe's time-honored ways with those of the corrupt wider world. Thomas Just and Ruth Small seem destined for each other. His grandfather is Witka, legendary hunter-seer who in times of need disappeared into the depths and "spoke with the whales, entreated them, and asked [ . . . ] if one of them would offer itself to the poor people on land." Ruth, meanwhile, is born with gill slits and kept briefly in a zinc tub so she won't "drown in air." But soon after they're married in a tribal ceremony, Thomas-on a bender with friends-impulsively enlists and ships off to Vietnam, leaving behind not only Ruth but, it turns out, the son she's pregnant with. Horrified by what he witnesses in war, Thomas melts into the landscape of Vietnam, where he lives ten years as a rice farmer, even fathering a daughter. He returns to the States-but not home, not yet. After a sojourn in Hawaii, he hears the tribe is to embark on a whale hunt. Ostensibly a reassertion of traditional values, it's actually a cynical scheme, with the whale oil promised to profiteers; this whale will be not entreated but slaughtered. Thomas takes part in the hunt, during which his estranged son is murdered. (Gifted with some of his great-grandfather's ability, Marco tries to dissuade his fellows from killing a whale too small and timid, and pays with his life.) Thomas withdraws to taciturn solitude in his grandfather's house, and Ruth courageously tries to punish the wrongdoers and uphold the old ways. Hogan excels, early on, in laying out triballore, and the book nicely exemplifies the difficulty of maintaining A'atsika values in a world grown smaller, more venal, more violent. But the abstract, preachy voice palls, and Thomas remains elusive, more symbol than person. Portentous and didactic.
"People of the Whale is pure magic—and pure truth. It's as perfect as a smooth stone."
"This book brings you deep into the realm of a people who have ancient, complex ties to the natural world…through a compelling and insistent narrative."
Tribal College Journal of American Indian Higher Education
"Hauntingly wise, beautifully written, and fiercely tender, People of the Whale goes between realms of animal and human, between Native and non-Native, between the radiant world as it once was and still might become. This book is a bridge, a revelation, an open heart."
"With her unparalleled gifts for truth and magic, Linda Hogan reinforces my faith in reading, writing, living."
"Deeply ecological, original, and spellbinding, Hogan ascends to an even higher plane in this hauntingly beautiful novel of the hidden dimensions of life, and all that is now imperiled."
"This is a fine story that embraces the worthy subjects of modern American Indians, the Vietnam War, and the importance of family."
Thomas Witka Just is a member of a fictional Northwest tribe with ties to the whale and the octopus. Unexpectedly, he signs up to fight in Vietnam, where he deserts the Army and forms another family. Stefan Rudnicki effectively uses his deep voice to render Thomas as a lost soul and his abandoned wife, Ruth, as the conscience of the tribe. The tribe is also lost, and when it revives the practice of whaling for the wrong reasons, a series of disasters occurs. Although Rudnicki's timing is impeccable—he slows and softens his tone with each tragedy—the overall narration is a bit overly dramatic—in the manner of reading to a child. A.B. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine
