Lake Superior, the north country, the great fresh-water expanse. Frigid. Lethal. Wildly beautiful. The Long-Shining Waters gives us three stories whose characters are separated by centuries and circumstance, yet connected across time by a shared geography.
In 1622, Grey Rabbit--an Ojibwe woman, a mother and wife--struggles to understand a dream-life that has taken on fearful dimensions. As she and her family confront the hardship of living near the "big water," her psyche and her world edge toward irreversible change. In 1902, Berit and Gunnar, a Norwegian fishing couple, also live on the lake. Berit is unable to conceive, and the lake anchors her isolated life, testing the limits of her endurance and spirit. And in 2000, when Nora, a seasoned bar owner, loses her job and is faced with an open-ended future, she is drawn reluctantly into a road trip around the great lake. As these narratives unfold and overlap with the mesmerizing rhythm of waves, a fourth mysterious character gradually comes into stark relief.
Rich in historical detail, and universal in its exploration of the human desire for meaning when faced with uncertainty, The Long-Shining Waters is an unforgettable and singular debut.
Titles and Awards:
- MILKWEED NATIONAL FICTION PRIZE WINNER
- INDIE HEARTLAND BESTSELLER
- ONE BOOK SOUTH DAKOTA SELECTION
- MINNESOTA BOOK AWARD FINALIST
- MIDWEST BOOKSELLERS BOOK AWARD FINALIST
About the Author :
Danielle Sosin is the author of the short-story collection Garden Primitives. Her fiction has been featured in the Alaska Quarterly Review and on National Public Radio, and she has received fellowships from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, The Ragdale Foundation, and Anderson Center. She lives in Duluth, Minnesota. The Long-Shining Waters is her first novel.
Review :
"Danielle Sosin has written the first great novel about Lake Superior--and its many ghosts."--Minnesota Monthly "We are plunged, fascinated and chilled, into one of three alternately narrated stories that make up this masterful ode to the sprawling, shape-shifting freshwater sea that is Lake Superior. . . . The construct is brilliant, the prose fine, the characters beautifully developed, the regional sense powerful. . . . This ode to the greatest of all lakes is nothing less than grand."--Star Tribune
"Elegant. . . . Through the stories of three women who lived centuries apart, Danielle Sosin explores the spirit of Lake Superior."--St. Paul Pioneer Press
"Danielle Sosin evokes the unforgettable pull of this watery expanse [Lake Superior]."--National Geographic Explorer
Sosin writes sensuously detailed prose and distills the emotions of her characters into a profound and universal need for acceptance and love. --Publishers Weekly (on The Long-Shining Waters)
The riveting opening moments of The Long-Shining Waters delivers us to the animate world of Grey Rabbit, four hundred years gone, and we realize we are in the hands of a visionary writer. Danielle Sosin's beautiful, resonant prose is a joy, and her devotion to what compels us to gather on the shores of great waters distinguishes this novel that is, as well, a great story. The intimate portrait of three women bound by their times and coming unbound in the great tidal pull of history is deeply affecting, wise and true. The Long-Shining Waters is an enchantment, a challenge, a tale to fall into and carry long after it's done. --Patricia Weaver Francisco, author of Telling
A truly inspiring and ambitious work of fiction. Haunting in its depiction of the life of its characters, The Long-Shining Waters is a wonderful book. I loved it. --Nuruddin Farah, author of Knots and Links
