Customer Reviews

True North

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

True North is riveting reading. I must admit I was not familiar with the author, Jim Harrison, until I read a book review in the L.A. Times about True North. The review was so well written, I couldn't wait to buy the book. As soon as I started reading it, I was so pleased to discover a new (to me) author whose writing is so rich and captivating.

I was fascinated with the depiction of this severly dysfunctional family as seen through the eyes of the central character, David Burke. All the characters, whether you like them or not (and there is one you should detest), are multi-dimensional and complex. David grows up with parents who are role models for what not to be, and a fiesty younger sister who turns out to be the most stable and rational member of the entire family. Over a period of decades, we witness David's struggle with his family's legacy, and watch how it shapes not only his romantic relationships, but his sense of right and wrong. David's journey is not an easy one as he searches for the meaning of his own life while trying to reconcile the sins of his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. What is it that he is really looking for? Justice or peace? Read this outstanding book and find out.

Jim Harrison is a writer's writer and a reader's writer and quite simply one of the best yarn spinners writing today. TRUE NORTH is a fine work of fiction that not only tells an intensely interesting story, it also exudes some of the more poetic prose and contemplative spiritual psychology that touches an audience of readers longing for books about environmentalism, about contemporary sexuality, about dysfunctional families, and about seeking sanity in a world apparently bent on squashing it.

Briefly, this is the story of David Burkett, born to Robber Barons in the Upper Penisula of Michigan who gained their wealth at the expense of destroying the timber lands which in turn deprived the Native Americans of their space and created a desecration of the land through logging and mining that permanently altered the target of their greed. But David wants revenge on his family's history, a history which includes his immediate family - a mother so lost in pills and alcohol and high society that she is unavailable, a father who is also an alcoholic, a pedophile, and in general a detestable boor who buys his way out of recurring run-ins with the law for raping young girls only to spend and squander the family fortune for his insatiable hedonism, and a sister Cynthia who, though younger than David, is brassy enough to escape this detestable family and run off with a half breed to disgrace the family she loathes. David attempts to avoid his genetic disposition by committing to right wing religion, but eventually fails in that and finds himself lusting after every female he encounters - never finding love, but never really knowing how to love. He finally decides his only salvation is to write a book that tells the public the truth about the environmental murderers of his family and his attempts to accomplish this mission fill the pages of this wondrous novel. How he finally arrives at a stage of self-realization and leaves his obsession with destroying the influence of his family's influence to discover that wearing the sins of his father around his neck has prevented him from looking up and ahead and seeing the beauty of nature and the connection with the meaning of life that this allows is the remarkable journey Harrison creates.

This story is never less than interesting and absorbing as a novel, but it is in the language of writing that Jim Harrison excels. His style includes free-association of sometimes a dozen thoughts and memories and observations in one paragraph. But he never loses us as readers. At times he stops for poetic words and the reader is strongly tempted to underline favorite passages as poems for re-reading later. "When you're sixteen your world is small and events easily conspire to make it even smaller. You have glimpses of greater dimensions but this perception easily retracts. Eros enlivens another world but not the simple world of masturbatory trance...Naturally during the act of love you're undisturbed by reality, a grace note I also found in trout fishing, but then lovemaking and fishing don't manage to dominate your life like you wished they could." "[Laurie] didn't so much die as withdraw, and her body under the sheet was still but there was an aura of departure that made me feel cold despite the warm room. Instead of pressing the button to call a nurse I listened to an aspect of emptiness I hadn't heard before as if her passing had stopped all other sound....When it was over I had nothing left about which to draw conclusions. My incomprehension was total. She was there and then she wasn't and though I understood the biological fact of death the whole ballooned outward from the mute sum of the parts." "...I recalled how a wonderfully cynical history professor had pointed out that when we came to America we were always discovering something like the source of the Mississippi that the Natives were already well aware of, but then our attitude to the Natives was not unlike Hitler's attitude toward the Jews. And the history of my family was not unlike the history of he United States. We were among the leading conquerors of a region and when we had thoroughly depleted its main resources we mythologized our destruction." "(Boating) With each stroke I'd think of something, say how all religions seemed to imitate and sacrifice themselves to temporal powers thus allowing greed to wrap itself in a semi-holy mantle, then after each strong stroke there was a long glide when I'd become utterly submerged in the sheer 'thingness' of life around me and be incapable of thought let alone comprehension: lake, water, sky, bird, my feet, my breathing." "I kept thinking that throughout the world there are sons and daughters with distorted wishes for what their parents should be, or hopeless wishes for what their parents should have been. Some of the most critical of us are afflicted with a paralysis over this, our brains too active with resentment to solidify function....My reaction had nothing to do with anger or curiosity but a mute acceptance of the human condition, the brain spinning tales before which we are quite helpless."

But one could continue quoting Harrison's writing and never touch on the moments of hilarity, of pathos, of tenderness, of unimaginable cruelty, all of which are blended in this amazing story. This is a novel to read again - like returning to your childhood to see if it really is what you remembered, or imagined. Highly recommended reading.

Though I can sympathize with them, the reviewers that complain about Harrison's rambling style and lack of focus in True North are unfortunately missing the point of the book. Those that stick with it will be generously rewarded.

This is first and foremost a novel of self-discovery and self-definition. Unfortunately, such journeys are not packaged neatly into a 3:15 song, a 90 minute movie, or 250 page tightly plotted novel (if someone knows the trick of discovering one's self in such a fashion, please post). And that's the poorly-kept secret of this book: a person's journey to find and perhaps save himself is a rambling, chaotic, often incoherent one and it's not going to fit well into our 20th/21st century indoctrinated idea of plot or novel.

In the hands of almost anyone else, such an approach would turn into a plodding, stumbling account of banalities, of burnt breakfasts and waiting in doctor's offices. This is not the case in True North. Harrison uses his wit, poetic training, and incredible clarity of observation to produce a wonderful inside view of David Burkett's struggle to make sense of his own life's story.

For those that couldn't stick with it, I suggest you put down your latest Dan Brown pablum and try True North again, this time with patience.

I purchased "Returning to Earth" simultaneously after a long absence of Harrison reading. Read "True North" first. "David" is the heir to a family that exploited Michigan's timber and mineral wealth and the novel covers his long effort to write of his family history, which he ultimately self-publishes in a few UP newspapers, but that matters only as one of numerous storylines within. Written from David's self-indulgent and overly critical perspective of his family history, Harrison weaves a compelling and consuming tale of David's dysfunctional family, his wives and lovers, the exploited timberland surrounding Lake Superior, and for good measure David's dog, Carla. Honestly, I read it in two days and called two of my friends who are Harrison fans. Wonderful.

I'd read some lukewarm reviews of this novel but was encouraged to read it anyway by a chum and fellow Harrison aficionado. "True North" did not disappoint me. The novel meanders, takes its time understanding people and places, and really thinks about the world and our relationship with the world. Many of the less-than-lustrous reviews I had read of "True North" cited all the above reasons as explanations FOR NOT reading this novel, which is ridiculous. If you love the Upper Peninsula, nature, food, sex, relationships - please read this book. It is excellant, and true.

This was my first Jim Harrison book. Being from Michigan, I've been curious about him for years but foolishly stayed away because I didn't like the movie version of Legends of the Fall, which certainly isn't Harrison's fault. Now I have some catching up to do.
True North is one of those books that stays in your mind long after you've finished it. The reader lives for a time in the mind of a naive, complicated, unhappy, yet hopeful young man who struggles to make sense of the world and his own place in it. His emotional isolation is mirrored by the remoteness of the setting; the depiction of Michigan's Upper Peninsula wilderness is completely accurate. The narrative is nothing short of poetic. Harrison is clearly a master of language. This is truly a beautiful book.

The book reminded me of a mixture of scenes from "Days of Our Lives" and "Catcher in the Rye". The book has its moments which makes the long read worthwhile. Do not let the first few chapters dissuade you. Jim Harrison is a great story teller especially when scenes are set in the Michigan Upper Peninsula and in this regard he does not disappoint.

Jim Harrison does not write happy books and this is no exception. Anyone who is looking for a feel good story may get some satisfaction from one novella in Legends of the Fall but in general, Harrison's plots are hard as nails and his main characters suffer. This book hits like a ton of bricks in the first few pages, backtracks, then traces itself from the past back to the beginning.
In my opinion, it is a great book, a classic tragedy in which the hero pays for the crimes of his ancestors. I think Harrison perfectly captures the psychology of damaged people, their compulsions, their failures, their often warped attempts at redemption, their occasional, almost helpless surrender to the worst that is in them. The poison they cannot purge.
The other reviewers are right, there are virtually no decent people in this book. But it is about corruption. The corruption of money, power, lust, booze. It is steeped in it, rubs your face in it, shocks you with it. If the excesses seem unbelievable or overwhelming, put it in the context of opera, myth or probably more accurately given the setting, Norse saga. In those forms the characters are larger than life, their offenses horrific, their emotions towering, everything is on a grand scale and eventually the whole thing and everyone involved crash in a cataclysm of retribution and sorrow in which there are no lessons to be learned or strength to be gained. Like Horatio, Harrison mourns the dead and tells their story. And it is a crusher.

OK, so I will admit that I read Returning To Earth first and so that may have put an expectation in me when I began True North. David Burkett, the narrator is the son in a well to do family who seems more at odds with his fortune than with reality. Hetends to come across as a rich and spoiled wayward kid with no compass despite his ability to navigate the UP. As well as Jim Harrison writes and does make me chuckle at times, I can't say this novel had the depth and breadth found in Returning to Earth. I guess I should have read this book first, but I feel that had I done so, I would not have been able to discover Returning to Earth - well, maybe, but this book was not his best work.
I did find that his writing, maybe since I spent some time reading this novel, was not as crisp, well thought out or edited and lacked character insight I was expecting.
I recommend reading this book first and then Returning to Earth. Do not read the two in reverse as I have or you may find yourself disappointed. I guess it's just natural for some writers to progress from one book to the next and in this case it shows.

I loved the one-page prologue: The son is on the boat, which is in the water off Veracruz even though we know the bulk of the story probably takes place in northern Michigan. The father's face has been beaten to a pulp. They cut off both of his hands and duct-taped the stubs. He is in extreme pain and wishes very earnestly to die so he can stop the pain. The son pushes him out of the boat, and the father slowly sinks below the surface and drowns.

The protagonist is from a rich family that denuded the Michigan forests and ran mining operations in Northern Michigan. In other words, financial robber barons and ecological criminals. This perplexes our hero greatly, and he decides to research the evil in his family (mostly his grandfather's and great grandfather's actions) I guess as a means to understand it and purge himself of it. Clearly, our hero identifies more with Native Americans and lives that lifestyle, unlike his salacious and out of control father. There are two major plotlines in this story, one being the hero's quest to find out more about his family's history and the other being his amorous adventures with young ladies.

One problem is with all of his female sex partners. None of them are shy and withdrawn or self-conscious about their bodies. And they all seem to approach sex with the same exact attitude and techniques, and that attitude is total abandon. It's as if, during the sex scenes, they are all the same character. It's one failing Harrison has in this novel. He doesn't seem to know how to write female characters. It's as if they were all guys with female genitals.

Another problem is related to something Robert McKee addresses in his book, STORY. I think he calls it the Law of Conservative Response. In McKee's book, he asserts that, when confronted by a dilemma or crisis, people tend to respond with the least amount of effort possible, which of course implies that, as new permutations of the problem arise, the responses develop greater magnitude. In this story, it seems as if the problem stays at the same level and so do his responses. This situation is also alluded to in Donald Maass's book, WRITING THE BREAKOUT NOVEL. In it, Maass talks about that old chestnut, "Raising the Stakes". In other words, the consequences of the protagonist's actions become greater and the results of failure responses more dire as the story continues. And I kind of didn't have that feeling with this story. First of all, what is the great reward if the hero totally researches and understands what his ancestors did? How does that make him feel better or turn him into a better person? Also, what is the negative consequence if he fails in his mission? Not a lot as far as I can see. He won't be appreciably more screwed up than he already is.

That said, let me offer a taste of Harrison's style. You may remember I said that the hero is preoccupied with both sex and religion. Here's a passage from page 48:

I continued on to the tip of Presque Isle then circled around the west side of the peninsula and back toward home, a three-hour walk loaded with sappy feelings about Laurie, the kind of emotional schmaltz that makes country music so sodden. I made a detour to avoid passing the Baptist church what with the odors of the sin of fornication on my skin, not a small item after a year that included baptism, prayer meetings, and my prolonged and devout study of the Bible. I consoled myself by thinking that fooling with girls didn't seem high on Jesus' agenda of the forbidden, and while St. Paul was doubtless a good man he tended toward dreariness. This sort of waffling is typical of young fundamentalists looking for an angle in which they may behave as they wish.

The story is divided, so far, into three sections: the 1960s, the 1970s and the 1980s. Since I graduated high school in 1959, it's easy for me to get caught up these decades as my own age during these times mirrors the age of the protagonist. Harrison's use of detail from these decades appears to be flawless, and he culls up memories of things that I didn't realize I still had.