Sukkwan Island Part 12

Jim woke Ned, who complained that it was early. Jim lay down again and tried to sleep. He was practicing his confession as he drifted off. I, Jim Fenn, murdered my son, Roy Fenn, back in the fall, probably nine months ago. I killed him by shooting him in the head at close range with my pistol, a Ruger .44 Magnum, which was recovered, I think, by the sheriff. I was suicidal and had been talking on the radio with my ex-wife Rhoda, who said she didn't want to get back together with me and was planning to marry another man, and I couldn't stand it any more and I was too cowardly to kill myself so I killed my son.

That wasn't quite right. He went back to his motivations, because they would ask about those, he knew. He went over each incriminating detail, over and over, the pistol, the radios, using everything. He was so exhausted he couldn't keep it straight. His mind had stopped and his body felt tiny, as if he were an infant. He was a tiny golden infant shrunken inside himself with strings reaching out to each part of this larger body, pulling in. He was vanis.h.i.+ng.

Jim woke with a rope around his neck yanking him from his bunk. He tried to scream but he couldn't. He was on the floor, hit a bulkhead, was struggling, then saw Ned with a wooden bat hitting him across the legs. He fell, was dragged along, got a glimpse of Chuck at the other end of the rope and knew he should have seen this coming. It should have been so obvious. Then he blacked out.

When he hit the water, it was so cold he woke and wanted them to find him and rescue him. Wanted Chuck and Ned to come get him. He struggled with the rope at his neck, freed it easily, but he was in his clothes, sinking, weighted down, and he didn't have a life jacket. He felt enormously sorry for himself. The open ocean was an awesome sight. Peaks forming everywhere, tossing and disappearing, hillsides rolling past. It was impossible to believe it was just water, impossible to believe, also, how far it extended beneath him. He struggled for what seemed forever and might have been ten minutes before he numbed and tired and began swallowing water. He thought of Roy, who had had no chance to feel this terror, whose death had been instant. He threw up water involuntarily and swallowed and breathed it in again like the end it was, cold and hard and unnecessary, and he knew then that Roy had loved him and that that should have been enough. He just hadn't understood anything in time.

PRAISE.

FOR LEGEND OF A SUICIDE LEGEND OF A SUICIDE.

"The reportorial relentlessness of Vann's imagination often makes his fiction seem less written than chiseled. A small, lovely book has been written out of his large and evident pain. 'A father, after all,' Vann writes, 'is a lot for a thing to be.' A son is also a lot for a thing to be; so is an artist. With Legend of a Suicide Legend of a Suicide, David Vann proves himself a fine example of both."

-Tom Bissell, New York Times Book Review New York Times Book Review "As the t.i.tle suggests, the stories in Legend of a Suicide Legend of a Suicide approach a private mythos, revisiting, reinvestigating, and reinventing one family's broken past. They also transport us to wild, un-charted places on the Alaskan coast and in the American soul. Throughout, David Vann is a generous, sure-handed guide in some very dangerous territory." approach a private mythos, revisiting, reinvestigating, and reinventing one family's broken past. They also transport us to wild, un-charted places on the Alaskan coast and in the American soul. Throughout, David Vann is a generous, sure-handed guide in some very dangerous territory."

-Stewart O'Nan, author of Songs for the Missing Songs for the Missing "Headlong narrative pacing, a memorable train-wreck father who gives Richard Russo's characters a run for their money, and a sure, sharp, inviting voice. So hard to put down that I am thinking of suing David Vann for several hours of lost sleep."

-Lionel Shriver, author of So Much for That So Much for That "His legend is at once the truest memoir and the purest fiction.... Nothing quite like this book has been written before."

-Alexander Linklater, Observer Observer (London) (London) "Brilliant.... Vann's prose follows the sinews of Cormac McCarthy and Hemingway, yet has its own nimble flex."

-The Times (London) (London) "Vengeful yet sorrowing and empathetic, plausible yet dreamlike, and completely absorbing."

-Christopher Tayler, The Guardian The Guardian (London) (London) "As primal and unforgiving as the Alaskan wilds where it's set."

-Bret Anthony Johnston, Men's Journal Men's Journal "David Vann's extraordinary and inventive set of fictional variations on his father's death will surely become an American cla.s.sic."

-The Times Literary Supplement (London) (London) "A reckoning.... A very difficult book for the very best reasons: it is written with great honesty and journeys unflinchingly into darkness.... A message of profound sympathy and sadness, anger and regret, Legend of a Suicide Legend of a Suicide is the melting away of one man's past and the reshaping of tragedy into art." is the melting away of one man's past and the reshaping of tragedy into art."

-Greg Schutz, Fiction Writers Review Fiction Writers Review "A powerful new voice has emerged in fiction."

-The Sunday Times (London) (London) "A piece of relentless, heartbreaking brilliance that bears comparison with Cormac McCarthy's Road Road."

-The Weekend Australian Magazine "In his portrayal of a young son's love for his lost father, David Vann has created a stunning work of fiction: surprising, beautiful, and intensely moving."

-Nadeem Aslam, author of Maps for Lost Lovers Maps for Lost Lovers and and The Wasted Vigil The Wasted Vigil "The most powerful, and pure, piece of writing I have read for a very long time. This book squeezes more life out of the first 100 pages than most books could manage in 1000, which is pretty impressive, considering it's a book about death."

-Ross Raisin, author of Out Backward Out Backward "This is my 'One to watch.'...It's stunning, beautifully written, with genuine surprises and a complexity that makes you retrace your steps, wonder what really happened, and ponder over the whole scenario for days. I loved it. It's Richard Yates, Annie Proulx territory, and highly recommended."

-Sarah Broadhurst, Bookseller Bookseller (London) (London) "David Vann's dark and strange book twists through natural forces and compressed emotions toward an extraordinary and dreamlike conclusion. One of the most gripping debuts I've ever read."

-Philip h.o.a.re, author of Leviathan; or, The Whale Leviathan; or, The Whale "A truly great writer."

-The Irish Sunday Independent (Ireland) (Ireland) "For the imagery alone and for the sentences, the book would be a treasure."

-Colm Toibin "Extraordinary.... Reminiscent of Tobias Wolff, Vann's prose is as pure as a gulp of water from an Alaskan stream."

-Financial Times

Other Books by DAVID VANN DAVID VANN NONFICTION.

A Mile Down: The True Story of a Disastrous Career at Sea

Credits Cover ill.u.s.tration by Dan Funderburgh

Continue reading for an excerpt from David Vann's new book Caribou Island On Sale January 18, 2011

The prize-winning author of Legend of a Suicide Legend of a Suicide delivers his highly antic.i.p.ated debut as a novelist-a noir tale of a marriage unraveling under the forces of rage and regret, set against the backdrop of the unforgiving Alaskan wilderness. delivers his highly antic.i.p.ated debut as a novelist-a noir tale of a marriage unraveling under the forces of rage and regret, set against the backdrop of the unforgiving Alaskan wilderness.

On a small island in a glacier-fed lake on Alaska's Kenai Peninsula, a marriage is unraveling. Gary, driven by 30 years of diverted plans, and Irene, haunted by a tragedy in her past, are trying to rebuild their life together. Following the outline of Gary's old dream, they're hauling logs to Caribou Island in good weather and in terrible storms, in sickness and in health, to build the kind of cabin that drew them to Alaska in the first place.

But this island is not right for Irene. They are building without plans or advice, and when winter comes early, the overwhelming desolation of the prehistoric wilderness threatens to push them, and their marriage, to the edge. Caught in the maelstrom is their daughter, Rhoda, who is wrestling with the hopes and disappointments of her own life. Devoted to her parents, she watches helplessly as they drift further apart.

Brilliantly drawn and fiercely honest, Caribou Island Caribou Island is rooted in a world of profound violence and regret-a novel of marriage and exile, set against the isolation of Alaska's primal landscape. is rooted in a world of profound violence and regret-a novel of marriage and exile, set against the isolation of Alaska's primal landscape.

CARIBOU ISLAND.

a novel David Vann

Chapter 1.

My mother was not real. She was an early dream, a hope. She was a place. Snowy, like here, and cold. A wooden house on a hill above a river. An overcast day, the old white paint of the buildings made brighter somehow by the trapped light, and I was coming home from school. Ten years old, walking by myself, walking through dirty patches of snow in the yard, walking up to the narrow porch. I can't remember how my thoughts went then, can't remember who I was or what I felt like. All of that is gone, erased. I opened our front door and found my mother hanging from the rafters. I'm sorry, I said, and I stepped back and closed the door. I was outside on the porch again.

You said that? Rhoda asked. You said you were sorry?

Yes.

Oh, Mom.

It was long ago, Irene said. And it was something I couldn't see even at the time, so I can't see it now. I don't know what she looked like hanging there. I don't remember any of it, only that it was.

Rhoda scooted closer on the couch and put her arm around her mother, pulled her close. They both looked at the fire. A metal screen in front, small hexagons, and the longer Rhoda looked, the more these hexagons seemed like the back wall of the fireplace, made golden by flame. As if the back wall, black with soot, could be revealed or trans.m.u.ted by fire. Then her eyes would s.h.i.+ft and it would be only a screen again. I wish I had known her, Rhoda said.

Me too, Irene said. She patted Rhoda's knee. I need to get to sleep. Busy day tomorrow.

I'll miss this place.

It was a good home. But your father wants to leave me, and the first step is to make us move out to that island. To make it seem he gave it a try.

That's not true, Mom.

We all have rules, Rhoda. And your father's main rule is that he can never seem like the bad guy.

He loves you, Mom.

Irene stood and hugged her daughter. Goodnight, Rhoda.

In the morning, Irene carried her end of log after log, from the truck to the boat. These are never going to fit together, she said to her husband, Gary.

I'll have to plane them down a bit, he said, tight-lipped.

Irene laughed.

Thanks, Gary said. He already had that grim, worried look that accompanied all his impossible projects.

Why not build a cabin with boards? Irene asked. Why does it have to be a log cabin?

But Gary wasn't answering.

Suit yourself, she said. But these aren't even logs. None of them is bigger than six inches. It's going to look like a hovel made out of sticks.

They were at the upper campground on Skilak Lake, the water a pale jade green from glacial runoff. Flaky from silt, and because of its depth, never warmed much, even in late summer. The wind across it chill and constant, and the mountains rising from its eastern sh.o.r.e still had pockets of snow. From their tops, Irene had often seen, on clear days, the white volcanic peaks of Mount Redoubt and Mount Iliamna across the Cook Inlet and, in the foreground, the broad pan of the Kenai Peninsula: spongy green and red-purple moss, the stunted trees r.i.m.m.i.n.g wetlands and smaller lakes, and the one highway snaking silver in sunlight as a river. Mostly public land. Their house and their son Mark's house the only buildings along the sh.o.r.e of Skilak, and even they were tucked back into trees so the lake still could seem prehistoric, wild. But it wasn't enough to be on the sh.o.r.e. They were moving out, now, to Caribou Island.

Gary had backed his pickup close to where the boat sat on the beach with an open bow, a ramp for loading cargo. With each log, he stepped onto the boat and walked its length. A wobbly walk, because the stern was in the water and bobbing.

Lincoln logs, Irene said.

I've heard about enough, Gary said.

Fine.

Gary pulled another small log. Irene took her end. The sky darkened a bit, and the water went from light jade to a blue-gray. Irene looked up toward the mountain and could see one flank whited. Rain, she said. Coming this way.

We'll just keep loading, Gary said. Put on your jacket if you want.

Gary wearing a flannel work s.h.i.+rt, long-sleeved, over his T-s.h.i.+rt. Jeans and boots. His uniform. He looked like a younger man, still fit for his mid-fifties. Irene still liked how he looked. Unshaven, unshowered at the moment, but real.

Shouldn't take much longer, Gary said.

They were going to build their cabin from scratch. No foundation, even. And no plans, no experience, no permits, no advice welcome. Gary wanted to just do it, as if the two of them were the first to come upon this wilderness.

So they kept loading, and the rain came toward them a white shadow over the water. A kind of curtain, the squall line, but the first drops and wind always. .h.i.t just before, invisible, working ahead of what she could see, and this always came as a surprise to Irene. Those last moments taken away. And then the wind kicked up, the squall line hit, and the drops came down large and heavy, insistent.

Irene grabbed her end of another log, walked toward the boat with her face turned away from the wind. The rain blowing sideways now, hitting hard. She wore no hat, no gloves. Her hair matting, drips off her nose, and she felt that first chill as the rain soaked through her s.h.i.+rt to her arms, one shoulder, her upper back and neck. She hunched away from it as she walked, placed her log, and then walked back hunched the other way, her other side soaking through now, and she s.h.i.+vered.

Gary walking ahead of her, hunched also, his upper body turned away from the rain as if it wanted to disobey his legs, take off in its own direction. He grabbed the end of another log, pulled it out, stepping backward, and then the rain hit harder. The wind gusted, and the air was filled with water, white even in close. The lake disappeared, the waves gone, the transition to sh.o.r.e become speculative. Irene grabbed the log and followed Gary into oblivion.

The wind and rain formed a roar, against which Irene could hear no other sound. She walked mute, found the bow, placed her log, turned and walked back, no longer hunched. There was no dry part left to save. She was soaked through.

Gary walked past her a kind of bird man, his arms curved out like wings first opening. Trying to keep his wet s.h.i.+rt away from his skin? Or some instinctive first response to battle, readying his arms? When he stopped at the truck bed, water streamed off the end of his nose. His eyes hard and small, focused.

Irene moved in close. Should we stop? she yelled over the roar.

We have to get this load out to the island, he yelled back, and then he pulled another log, so Irene followed, though she knew she was being punished. Gary could never do this directly. He relied on the rain, the wind, the apparent necessity of the project. It would be a day of punishment. He would follow it, extend it for hours, drive them on, a grim determination, like fate. A form of pleasure to him.

Irene followed because once she had endured she could punish. Her turn would come. And this is what they had done to each other for decades now, irresistibly. Fine, she would think. Fine. And that meant, just wait.

Another half an hour of loading logs in the rain. Irene was going to get sick from this, chilled through. They should have been wearing rain gear, which they had in the cab of the truck, but their stubbornness toward each other had prevented that. If she had gone for her jacket when Gary suggested it, that would have interrupted the work, slowed them down, and it would have been noted, held against her, a small shake of the head, perhaps even a sigh, but removed by long enough he could pretend it wasn't about that. Above all else, Gary was an impatient man: impatient with the larger shape of his life, with who he was and what he'd done and become, impatient with his wife and children, and then, of course, impatient with all the little things, any action not done correctly, any moment of weather that was uncooperative. A general and abiding impatience she had lived in for over thirty years, an element she had breathed.

The last log loaded, finally, and Gary and Irene swung the bow ramp into place. It was not heavy, not rea.s.suring. Black rubber where it met the side plates of the boat, forming a seal. This would be their only way back and forth from the island.

I'll park the truck, Gary said, and stomped off through the rocks. The rain still coming down, though not as blown now. Enough visibility to know direction, though not enough to see the island from here, a couple miles out. Irene wondered what would happen when they were in the middle. Would they see any of the sh.o.r.e, or only white all around them? No GPS on the boat, no radar, no depth finder. It's a lake, Gary had said at the dealers.h.i.+p. It's only a lake.

There's water in the boat, Irene said when Gary returned. It was pooling under the logs, gathered especially in the stern, almost a foot deep from all the rain.

We'll take care of it once we're out, Gary said. I don't want to use the battery for the bilge pump without the engine on.

So what's the plan? Irene asked. She didn't know how they would push the boat off the beach, weighed down with the logs.

You know, I'm not the only one who wanted this, Gary said. It's not just my plan. It's our plan.