Whatever else may be said of Guy Vanderhaeghe, author of The English Boy, he does at least have one serious fan. The admirer in question is Annie Proulx, who appears on the front cover of this new novel extolling ‘a feast of a book’, and on the back suggesting that ‘here are brilliant writing, picaresque adventure, history and studies of human nature’. Miss Proulx’s work, it may be said, comes from much the same territory as her protégé: that vast, underpopulated expanse of prairie running all the way from Wyoming to mid-western Canada, where a sharp pain in the fleeing horseman’s leg is pretty sure to have come courtesy of the teeth of an opportunistic timberwolf.
Prospective readers looking for another slice of North America à la Proulx, full of characters with names like Tulk Farrago gamely founding their steakhouse diners in defiance of foreclosing banks, will probably be disappointed by The Last Crossing.
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