The North doesn’t play favourites.
Welcome back to the North.
According to author Tom Stewart, he hadn’t intended to write a sequel to Immortal North, “Yet, here we are. The tale felt unfinished.” Immortal North Two begins within the heart-thumping final moments of the previous novel, and in chapters that alternate between the town and the woods, between the present and the past, following the tortured inner thoughts of a backwoods man who has apparently lost everything, we get a deeper understanding of “the trapper” and a deeper understanding of how loss and grief are navigated and processed. I didn’t know that I needed a sequel to this story, but I’m glad it exists and can whole-heartedly recommend the duology to any reader. (My thanks to the author for an Advanced Reading Copy; passages quoted may not be in their final forms.)
When the trapper was young he was told a story of a mythical arrow shot from a mythical bow. For that arrow to reach its target, it had to cross half the distance. Then it had to halve that distance again. Then again, and so on. Of course that particular arrow never reaches its target because it never crosses all those infinite halves. How could it? That still made some sense to him. Turns out this arrow is not that arrow. A part of him was surprised.
After a brief scene-setting bit of nature writing, we rejoin the trapper as an arrow — the broadhead so pretty and dazzling in its flight as it sliced through that spectrum of morning light — is coursing through the air towards him. Acts and their consequences propel the plot from there, but as ever, plot isn’t the most interesting part of a novel to me (although I will say that for those who enjoy a cracking good yarn, this one has plenty of snap; for those who enjoy a more emotional read, this has plenty of pull). The sections in the present day — following the trapper as he struggles to carry on — were compelling and believable; interwoven organically with ideas from philosophers ranging from Zeno to Frankl. I loved the concept of the big trapper and little trapper disagreeing within his mind, as well as the role that nature takes in his healing process. There are also some wonderful scenes set in the past: I particularly liked an epic poker game that once affected the fortunes of the trapper’s family and the tale of the trapper’s grandparents meeting at a country dance:
Love was in the air and couples danced within it. Her thin hand in his. And from that clasp would come other life. Unbeknownst to them, where their palms met, roots sprouted. Small vines already curling out between their fingers.
Stewart’s writing is filled with savoury metaphor and allusion and bits of wisdom, and I’ll share here a few tasty bits:
• His eyes on the curled grey ashes in the stove, like the fire had eaten the bones but left the feathers.
• The legend of the trapper grew — people like to talk and they poured those truths some drinks.
• He had always been a slow reader and now he was a slower reader and he considered that progress.
This sequel didn’t affect me quite as hard as the first novel did — probably because everything truly affecting had already occurred before this opens — but as an exploration of the consequences of those *cough* affecting events, this was really well done. And probably necessary. Again: I’m glad Immortal North Two exists and look forward to reading whatever the author comes out with next.
And he was nine-tenths pain, and one-tenth pain, and some impossible fraction of hysterical love, ‘cause for the smallest wild part of him, some piece at once defiant to and accepting of the misery and cruelty of life, and any circumstance or force that would impose on him great suffering which might break his will and then break the man — this felt raw and that felt good. See his resolve in a tiny smile.
