Book Review | Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice

Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice
Published by: October 2nd, 2018 on ECW Press
Genre: Fiction, Science Fiction, Dystopia, Cultural (Canada)
Pages: 218
Format: eBook
Source: Borrowed from the library

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Summary (from Goodreads): A daring post-apocalyptic thriller from a powerful rising literary voice.

With winter looming, a small northern Anishinaabe community goes dark. Cut off, people become passive and confused. Panic builds as the food supply dwindles. While the band council and a pocket of community members struggle to maintain order, an unexpected visitor arrives, escaping the crumbling society to the south. Soon after, others follow.

The community leadership loses its grip on power as the visitors manipulate the tired and hungry to take control of the reserve. Tensions rise and, as the months pass, so does the death toll due to sickness and despair. Frustrated by the building chaos, a group of young friends and their families turn to the land and Anishinaabe tradition in hopes of helping their community thrive again. Guided through the chaos by an unlikely leader named Evan Whitesky, they endeavor to restore order while grappling with a grave decision.

Review: I went into this not knowing much about it. Only that it took place on a reserve in Canada and that the mystery was a slow build. The end of the world creeps up slowly and starts with the connection with the outside world going dark. Finding out what was happening and how this started kept my interest piqued and virtually flipping the pages of this eBook while listening to the audiobook.

If you have the option/audiobook available to download at your library or audiobook subscription please give it a go! It was so nice to hear the voice of the narrator as it really made me feel in the story. Hearing the dialect and Anishinaabe words aloud added an extra touch I didn’t know I needed.

This one felt like a real “end of the world” apocalypse scenario and I wish I learned more about how it started in the first place. The characters were real, fleshed out, and you could feel the connection they all had with one another.

Great first read of Rice’s writing and I am excited to read more about First Nations in Canada.

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