Her plan leads to tragedy when she interferes with scientist Leif Trygvesen, who has come to research the effects of oil spills on salt marshes - and evade the draft. An orphan traumatized by her past, she seeks respect in her traditional Inupiat village through the outlawed path of shamanism. So relates Kayuqtuq Ugungoraseok, 'the red fox'. And there was a young woman who flew into the world of spirits to save herself.' There was a young man who hunted geese to feed his family and another who studied geese to save them. There was a war and a university, an oil company and a small village, all run by men. Outsiders came, but it was not to learn from us it was to change us. 'It was a time when much was hidden, before outsiders came on bended knee to learn from the elders. ~ Dorothy Jean Ray, author of A Legacy of Arctic Art, and The Eskimos of Bering Strait 1650-1898ġ971, the Alaskan Arctic.

With the author’s unerring knowledge of anthropology and social and environmental issues, it could fit any rural Alaskan village.” “Memorable.One of the best novels of Alaska that I have read. Briggs, Professor Emeritus, Department of Anthropology, Memorial University of Newfoundland and author of Never in Anger (Thomas) has a fine grasp of the complexity of human relations and culture in such a village. I wept my way through it, identifying profoundly with both protagonists. Their tale, woven from threads of psychological thriller, love story, eco-fiction, science and the metaphysical, is set in a remote village and the wilds of the Alaskan Arctic in a time of great cultural and ecological upheaval. Flight of the Goose is an award-winning novel about an indigenous woman shaman, a draft-dodging bird scientist, and a young Inupiaq hunter caught between traditions.

Flight of the Goose by Lesley Thomas