Ragged Lake

Finished April 30

Ragged Lake by Ron Corbett

Taking place in a fiction place up in the Territories in northern Canada, this book is the first in a series featuring detective Frank Yakabuski. Frank is from the north, but went away for a while and spent some time doing undercover work related to motorcycle gangs in Montreal. He's been back in the north a few years and is considered a seasoned officer. 

Ragged Lake is very remote, with no roads in or out and only a weekly train service, mostly for supplies to a fishing and hunting camp located there. It was once a more bustling place, with a paper plants and a variety of other small businesses that supported the people that worked there. 

When a young tree-marker working in the area checks out a cabin built from scraps, he finds murder victims and immediately heads to the resort to report it using their phone. 

Frank is sent out with a couple of guys to assist with the investigation. It is winter and with the train not scheduled for a few days, he and his officers travel via the rail line by snowmobile, a trip that takes more than one day. 

They find that the report is accurate and that they have a crime on their hands, but there are more questions that come to Frank. Why are these people in the cabin there? Why have the chosen this place to build a home in? Who can he trust? are some of them. 

As we, alongside Frank and in a narrative that is separate and told partly through a written record, discover the connection of these people to this place and its history, the story of the indigenous people who have lived in the area, 

We get a sense of Frank and his character and his past in this introduction to the series. We also get a strong sense of one of the victims here, a young indigenous woman who has had bad luck again and again despite her own strength. 

This made me want to read more of this series. 

Devil's Pass

Finished March 8
Devil's Pass by Sigmund Brouwer

Another book in Seven: the Series. This one features Jim Webb, who goes by Webb. Jim is seventeen and has been living on his own a few months. Jim's dad died when he was ten and a few months later Jim's mom remarried his stepfather Elliott Skinner. Jim's life changed radically after that as he learned to live the life he was expected to, rather than the one he really wanted to live.
Jim task is given to him in steps. As he completes each leg of his journey he learns more about his grandfather, himself, and the nature of monsters. Despite Jim's efforts at hiding what was going on in his life, his grandfather knew there was something wrong and looked for the causes. Jim learned to be tough and street smart, to be alert to danger and prepare himself for most situations. Jim's love of music grew within him despite his circumstances, and helped him to deal with what life threw at him. He developed a strong sense of injustice and doing what was right and David, his grandfather knew that. That is what led him to choose this particular task for Jim.
Jim travels from Toronto, to the Northwest Territories, and beyond to find the answer to the question David has tasked him with. And, in doing so, perhaps finds a way to go home again.
This is a story about secrets, and about the different forms that monsters take in our lives, and about finding the truth behind the stories.
A very interesting task for a very interesting character.

Historical Fiction

Finished September 20
Above the Falls by John Harris
The story in this book is based on real people and real events in Canada's north. Harris has researched this well, and provided capsules on each person at the end of the book.
The setting is up in the Northwest Territories above the South Nahanni river at the lakes named Rabbitkettle and Glacier in 1936. The bush pilot George Dalziel (Dal) was known as the flying trapper, as he flew men to his traplines and gave them a cut of what he got from their work. There was a movement to close down this sort of activity as it was seen as encroaching on the natives' livelihood. Two trappers that Dal set down at his line disappeared near the end of the season, with their cabin destroyed. Harris takes that unsolved event and makes a story for it. The story is one that could have been true, and the events surrounding it are described well, with as much basis in fact as possible.
I found this interesting as it is an area and time that hasn't had a lot written about it, and thus opens new territory in Canadian literature. The conversations are well-written and flow and the story is made interesting for more than just the mens' disappearance.