![]() ![]() ![]() The quiet Xavier and the flamboyant, garrulous Elijah are just two more privates sucked into this hellhole. There is discomfort (lice, trench foot), there is horror, and there is morphine. There are endless trench raids as snipers fire from nests and big guns roar. ![]() ![]() As to its faithfulness, it doesn’t deviate from the standard accounts of trench warfare, so that here are the Canadian lines, while a few yards away is Fritz (aka the Hun, the Bosch). What prompted the Crees to enlist is unclear (a curious omission), but Niska blessed them with the wisdom of the ages: “You must do what you must do.” Boyden’s rendering of the war is both faithful and wrong-headed. It then alternates between Xavier’s last days, his and Niska’s recollections of the past (Niska is a diviner and windigo, or cannibal, killer), and scenes of the European battlefield, which get pride of place. The war is over when the story opens and a fever-stricken Xavier, sustained only by morphine, is coming home to Niska. Xavier learned his hunting skills from his auntie, Niska, and he in turn taught Elijah, who was schooled by nuns and speaks far better English than Xavier. Xavier Bird and Elijah Whiskeyjack, so-called bush Indians who live in the woods, have been friends since childhood. Two Cree Indians from eastern Canada experience WWI trench warfare in Canadian Boyden’s first novel (following his story collection, Born with a Tooth, 2001). ![]()
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