Monday, December 13, 2021

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice

 




Moon of the Crusted Snow is a novel by Wasauksing First Nation author Waubgeshig Rice, published by ECW Press, a Canadian small press that has put out a few interesting short novels and novellas I've read.*  The novel is a short one, featuring an Anishinaabe community in Canada during a total blackout of power and communications, as they try to work together to survive a brutal winter.  

*I got this book for free as a reward for posting a review of another book of theirs, but I give my word it did not affect this review.  I was looking to read this book anyway.  

The result is a really strong short novel, even if certain elements are rather predictable if you have any knowledge of the experience of First Nations people in Canada.  The story focuses upon a family who, due to being only a generation out of open persecution, weren't taught as children their people's culture and who have been trying to get back to that culture so as to teach it to their children - as they struggle to keep their community fed and surviving while others (outsiders and those who have been content not to try to contribute and be part of the community) who are selfish threaten them all.  This is not a happy story, but it works very well at making its points clear.  
----------------------------------------------------Plot Summary------------------------------------------------------
Evan Whitesky and his partner Nicole McCloud have been trying to raise their kids better than they had it growing up in their northern Anishinaabe community.  Evan hopes that they can teach their kids the aspects of their culture and language they were not taught growing up, to keep their people alive for another generation.  But even as Evan and many others do what they needs to teach their kids and to support their community and its ways, others take it all for granted and act selfishly.  

And so when one day all communication with the outside world goes dead...followed soon by all outside power sources, Evan and his companions take it on themselves to get the community ready to survive a harsh winter without the help of outside resources.  But not everyone is so willing to cooperate for the greater good, and when outsiders begin to arrive in search of their own chance at survival, Evan finds that their culture is threatened once again, and that some action is needed to save it for the next generation... 
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Moon of the Crusted Snow is a book framed by its main character Evan, and his place in the community.  This is a community that was devastated both population wise and culturally by the persecution from the Canadian settlers and majorities, both in Residential Schools and government policies and just individual actions that were meant to suppress their language, their religion, and their culture.  The oldest generation left living - and barely at that - in the community was taught by their parents the bases of their culture, but the generations after that all faced a Canada that tried to outlaw such teachings, resulting in mass cultural amnesia and loss - even for those who didn't want to lose such aspects, and even for those who were born and raised after the residential schools were over.  For Evan and his partner Nicole, their goal is to use what the elders of their people have retained and tried to teach them late to ensure that their kids, and the next generation, are raised in the way they should have, ingrained in their culture.  

And so Evan has gone back to some of the traditional ways, such as hunting for game and meat to put away to help his family and others he cares about to survive through the winter without relying on outside food sources (which he hunts respectively).  But while Evan is not alone, and is joined in his belief by the small council that helps run the community, as well as his parents and a bunch of others, there are a few even in the community who really don't care about that, and take advantage of their efforts selfishly - such as his lazy brother, or a rich man who turns up all his electricity for his comfort even when there are power issues.  And while the community is out of the way, and thus is not exactly a likely stop for outsiders, it still is tied to the outside - by its electric grid, by the occasional traveler who stops in, and by the few members of the community who left temporarily to go to school or for other reasons.  

And so when the science fiction aspect of this book hits, a total electronic and communications blackout in both their community and seemingly elsewhere, that conflict of peoples committed to each other and those committed to themselves comes to the fore - especially as things go on longer....and outsiders begin to appear, ones who have no aspect of community to care anything about.  I'm not going to spoil anything about how this winds up going, only that you will see a lot of it coming if you know anything about the histories of the interactions between white settlors and indigenous peoples in this continent (and the rest of the world too).  And yet it works so well because of how well it echoes allegorically and literally those interactions in the past and present (and the actions of one character in particular very much echoes not just the past, but some of our present during the current pandemic, now that I think about it).  

The book ends with the conflict resolved for now, and an attempt at moving on to a new life, one which provides hope of a better future....although it's certainly not one guaranteed.  Again this is not a happy story, and a lot of bodies are racked up in the end.  But it's one that makes sense and works, and those who aren't familiar with these perspectives will find this a very valuable read.  

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