Kirjahaku

This is a novel about culture shock, love, loss, identify, belonging, the Inuit people, and the birth of the Nunavut Territory in Arctic Canada. The setting is a small Inuit community on the west coast of Hudson Bay in the early 1970s. The story is told from the perspectives of multiple individuals speaking of their own experiences. These include an elderly Inuit hunter, his son who is adjusting to many cultural changes, and a nurse-midwife newly arrived from England to provide medical care in a community where all is new to her. As the story unfolds, these lives become interconnected.

This feast for the senses is just the ticket for anyone who has driven through the country and wondered "Gee, what would it be like to leave the city behind, move to a place full of meadows, vineyards, orchards and forests and start growing my own food." The author's innocence optimism and perseverance invite readers to imagine themselves undertaking such an adventure and make it all seem doable. The Fiddletown Stories is escapist literature at its very finest, filled with descriptions of the unique foothills environment and the colorful characters who inhabit it.