cover image No Man’s Land

No Man’s Land

John Vigna. Arsenal Pulp, $18.95 (336p) ISBN 978-1-55152-866-3

Vigna’s rugged and inventive debut novel (after the collection Bull Head)brings the drama, violence and lyric intensity of the King James Bible to the cold, merciless climes of the Canadian wilderness. In 1902, 14-year-old Davey, a tenacious orphan with a cursed history, roams the Pacific Northwest with a gang of troubled men and women led by the charismatic yet sinister Reverend Brown. Davey is a no-nonsense girl with little concern for the afterlife, and she is frequently at odds with Reverend Brown, whose constant, lofty speechifying on God, violence, and sin strike her as bombastic. She tags along though, somewhat nourished by the gang’s semblance of a family. Together, the group wanders from town to town, drumming up enthusiasm for Reverend Brown’s revivals, each one leading up to a mass nude baptism. The crew scrapes together a sustainable life, but greed, lust, and the other corruptions eventually culminate in spectacular moments of bloodshed. Vigna is a master craftsman. His language feels ancient, and he paints an unforgiving landscape with great detail and majesty. Though Reverend Brown is no prophet, readers will find in Vigna a writer worth paying close attention to. (Dec.)

Correction: An earlier version of this review incorrectly stated this was the author's first book.