Book of the Week: The Orenda by Joseph Boyden

The eagerly anticipated new novel from the Giller-winning author, The Orenda takes readers back to the mid-17th century to follow the interwoven lives of three characters: Bird, one of the Huron Nation’s great warriors, Christophe, a Jesuit missionary, and Snow Falls, a young Iroquois girl. The novel begins with Bird kidnapping Christophe and Snow Falls, and follows the characters as their lives grow more interconnected and interdependent. The characters are well-drawn and powerful, but The Orenda grows beyond the individual, and through their stories Boyden is able to capture not only the realities of several cultures, but the creation of a new country and people at its very beginnings.

The longlist of nominees for the 2013 Scotiabank Giller Prize will be announced on Monday morning, with a press conference at the University of British Columbia’s Museum of Anthropology. The museum’s world-renowned collection of First Nations art and artifacts will form a stunning — and appropriate —backdrop to a longlist which will, almost without a doubt, include Boyden’s stunning new novel.