by Jim Harrison
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Product Description
An epic tale that pits a son against the legacy of his family's desecration of the earth, and his own father's more personal violations, Jim Harrison's True North is a beautiful and moving novel that speaks to the territory in our hearts that calls us back to our roots.
The scion of a family of wealthy timber barons, David Burkett has grown up with a father who is a malevolent force and a mother made vague and numb by alcohol and pills. He and his sister Cynthia, a firecracker who scandalizes the family at fourteen by taking up with the son of their Finnish-Native American gardener, are mostly left to make their own way. As David comes to adulthood-often guided and enlightened by the unforgettable, intractable, courageous women he loves-he realizes he must come to terms with his forefathers' rapacious destruction of the woods of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, as well as the working people who made their wealth possible.
Jim Harrison has given us a family tragedy of betrayal, amends, and justice for the worst sins. True North is a bravura performance from one of our finest writers, accomplished with deep humanity, humor, and redemptive soul.
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Average Customer Review:
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 True North, 2009-01-05
Jim Harrison is, in my opinion one of the best writers we have today, I think he is very much undervalued by the public or whomever, I highly recommend his books. so much so that I named my dog Dalva which is the main character in one of his books, she is long gone and the next dog I owned I named Jim he was a golden retriever, very beautiful, yes I am a dog lover too. Now I have a service dog named Rosie, she helps me a lot as do Jim's books I always look forward to his latest book.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 True North but kind of went South, 2008-12-03
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.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
 This is the TRUE north?, 2008-07-15
I have just finished the book - perhaps 2 months. Kept hoping for some redeeming quality, but it never came. I thoroughly agree with Gary Mack, but cannot see why he gives it 4 stars. Carla was the best character in the story.
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
 A difficult and unrewarding read, 2008-06-23
True North
Jim Harrison
4 Stars
It's all typical Harrison, too formulaic, too predictable. Soon as you start reading you can guarantee that Christianity will be mocked, female characters will be easy sexual marks two pages after being introduced, sexual trysts are as common and forgotten as meals served, and every character exhibiting virtue will undoubtedly be a Native American.
Yes, Harrison can take you into the woods as well as any writer, including Hemingway, who Harrison jabs at around mid way through the novel. If you want to cast a fly fishing rod across a river, make love inside a giant white birch stump, or crawl through coyote dung, Harrison's your kind of writer.
However, if you need to see redeeming qualities in the characters you are going to spend 386 pages with, don't count on it with this work. This might be the most dysfunctional lot since the ensemble of the Seinfield sitcom.
It took seven months for me to read "True North", as I fought and fought myself to finish, feeling obligated by Harrison's reputation and celebrity status and my appreciation of his earlier works. After my hopes were dashed with Vernice, David's love interest introduced halfway through the narrative, my disgust and disdain for the novel grew to the point I had to let it sit for a few weeks again. When Vernice so flippantly tells David's Uncle Fred, a man she's met only once and probably is twice her age, "Your nephew is a fine young man except that he wants to ____ all the time," I had enough. I thought to myself, isn't there going to be any one who is truly good or realistic within the confines of this book? It could be me but I can't recall in my fifty years any female, young or old, speaking to me in such a caddy way.
And yes there's significance in the rape of Vera, and Fred's conversion to Zen Buddhism, the liberated humanism of Vernice, and of course, David's long drawn out symbolic confession. The odyssey ends with apologies to Vera; a research project that condemns his father and his Anglo lineage publicly and the gruesome and cruel murder of his father for all his evil transgressions. In the end, without a hint of remorse, all that's left is the sister and brother, again like children, digging a hole in the sand to bury the ashes and fragmented bones of their mother. Thus, the cycle of life continues.
When I finished the novel, outside of the dog-named Carla, I was left feeling empty about any of the other characters in the book. The pages are filled with nothing but drunks, embezzlers, whores, unfaithful spouses, who at any juncture, can showcase their sex organs and instantly gratify each other without a worry in the world. There's such a preoccupation with the male and female genitalia in this book; the mention of it alone could fill a couple of thick chapters.
Though Harrison is the consummate craftsman, a writer of his stature needs to deliver more. As in any great work of literature, at least one character has to express our better ways. In "True North", I feel I've wasted seven months of time with a group of people I honestly would not want to meet, let alone remember.
In the end, Mr. Harrison would do well by taking another look at some of Mr. Hemingway's work.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
Gritty and consuming...Harrison's prose, imagery, and characters draw you in and stick in your mind for years, 2007-03-31
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.
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