Canadian Fiction

Finished March 3
Wind Tails by Anne DeGrace
This is one of the ten finalists for the Evergreen award this year, and a great read.
The story is set at a cafe on a mountain pass highway in B.C. As the various characters pass through the cafe, we learn their back stories and how they came to be where they are. As you can guess from the title, the book is inspired by the wind and each chapter has a wind theme to it, from Tailwind to Wayward Wind to Wind Shift the action in the chapter matches the heading. All of the story takes place in the late '70s. Local characters range from the owner of the cafe herself, Cass, to the truck driver Archie who drops the occasional waif on her doorstep, to the local police officer, Bob. Passing through are Jo, a young teen out of Calgary; Pink, a young man from the U.S. travelling with the wind; and many others with shorter appearances on the road for their own reasons. I loved the characters and how their stories led into each others' experiences, as well as the location, where the author allows you to picture the scene in your mind. I found it very engaging and thought-provoking. While the time setting may be different, it speaks to the world today as well.