Danielle Sosin

A stunningly beautiful read. We meet three strong, challenged women whose stories are woven together around the central character of this novel, Lake Superior. Grey Rabbit is an Ojibwe woman living with her family along the shores of Gichigami, the big water, in a time before anyone in her ken had seen a white face. She is plagued with disturbing dreams which she cannot understand, but which make her fearful for the safety of her sons. Nearly 300 years later, Berit tends home and hearth along the same shores, while her husband Gunnar makes a living casting his nets into the Great Lake's unforgiving waves, and working for weeks at a time in a distant lumber camp. She too has dreams...waking dreams in which she stares across the water, or into its depths seeking the faces of her own children...children who have never materialized. And at the beginning of the 21st century, Nora, a widow, suffers the loss of her livelihood when her bar burns to the ground, seemingly taking all her memories with it. As she sets out to document each lost sunken ship painting, bit of driftwood, sign and nautical ornament in a notebook, she drives aimlessly around the lake, looking for the answer to the big question that heads her last page---"What next?". Serving as a sort of grout between the mosaic tiles of these three stories are the lyrical observations of a drowned man who sees the timeless world above him through a watery lens. Common images grace each section---dragonflies, wolves, white butterflies, the northern lights, agates. It's nearly impossible to convey the overall effect of this marvelous piece of writing. There isn't a lot of action, and none of the stories comes to a definitive resolution, but Life carries forward. "Water circles from sea to sky and back. It lifts through tree roots, releases through leaves, and all the animals make their paths. To the water, always changing, always wholly receptive."… (altro)

After living by The Great Lake for two years many years ago and innumerable trips to its shores over the years, I was delighted to find this book that captured the majesty and mayhem that is contained in Lake Superior. Danielle Sosin is a wordmaster who uses the voices of three very different types of women in three different centuries to tell the stories of the hardships of living in a cold, isolated land. in 1622, Grey Rabbit has lost her mind to the unmerciful dreams that haunt her. In 1902, Berit is left alone on the shores of the lake that both taunts her and helps heal her grief. In 2000, Nora loses her livelihood when her bar burns down and she turns to the lake to make her decision of what to do next. The connection between these three women is created through the power of a lake that embodies the harmony between humans and nature. The best example of this is Grey Rabbit's epiphany:

Grey Rabbit uncovers her head to the dazzling morning, the water below her sloshing with light, and the wind blowing through the tops of the pines. Her heart feels open and sore, as she stands humbled before the Great Spirit, Gichi-Manitou. The essence. The mystery surrounding her.

Her legs and her feet tingle as she stands. She stretches tall, breathes the pine-filled air, bends forward and touches the rough rock with her fingers. The sensation of heat rises with her torso, through her chest and up the back of her neck, boring finally through the crown of her head. When she stands her full height, the world goes mute and a strong silent wind blows against her face. She spreads her arms and lets it blow over her.

A white bird is racing over the water. Not a bird, but a mass of small white butterflies. When they pass overhead they take the wind with them and give her back the sounds of the morning--a piping chickadee and the water below. And for that moment she becomes the water's sparkling energy, the rock, the pines--she's indistinguishable from the air. Like sunlight. Like the expansive nature of gratitude. Grey Rabbit encompasses everything. (139, 140)

It is because of words that create sensuous images like this that earned Ms. Sosin the Milkweed National Fiction Prize in 2011. One final note: there is a fourth "mystery" voice at the end of each chapter of the book. It is written in a poetic style and seems to be all-knowing about all things Superior. I have my own ideas about the identity of the voice; however, it doesn't really matter that much to me. It adds depth, richness, and a sense of eeriness to a book that I will be thinking about for some time to come.… (altro)