An atmospheric, transporting tale of adventure, love, and survival from the bestselling author of The Snow Child, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.
In the winter of 1885, decorated war hero Colonel Allen Forrester leads a small band of men on an expedition that has been deemed impossible: to venture up the Wolverine River and pierce the vast, untamed Alaska Territory. Leaving behind Sophie, his … Alaska Territory. Leaving behind Sophie, his newly pregnant wife, Colonel Forrester records his extraordinary experiences in hopes that his journal will reach her if he doesn’t return–once he passes beyond the edge of the known world, there’s no telling what awaits him.
The Wolverine River Valley is not only breathtaking and forbidding but also terrifying in ways that the colonel and his men never could have imagined. As they map the territory and gather information on the native tribes, whose understanding of the natural world is unlike anything they have ever encountered, Forrester and his men discover the blurred lines between human and wild animal, the living and the dead. And while the men knew they would face starvation and danger, they cannot escape the sense that some greater, mysterious force threatens their lives.
Meanwhile, on her own at Vancouver Barracks, Sophie chafes under the social restrictions and yearns to travel alongside her husband. She does not know that the winter will require as much of her as it does her husband, that both her courage and faith will be tested to the breaking point. Can her exploration of nature through the new art of photography help her to rediscover her sense of beauty and wonder?
The truths that Allen and Sophie discover over the course of that fateful year change both of their lives–and the lives of those who hear their stories long after they’re gone–forever.
A Washington Post Notable Book
A Goodreads Choice Award Nominee
A Library Journal Top 10 Book of the Year
A BookPage Best Book of the Year
more
This was one of my favorite books I’ve read this year. There are three storylines: a man exploring the wild frontiers of Alaska in the late 1800s, his equally-courageous wife anticipating his return, and a pair of strangers learning about the expedition centuries later.
Every letter, journal entry, and newspaper clipping has something interesting and special — whether it’s eerie magic realism, Psalmist-inspired poetic ramblings, or fascinating anthropological notes.
The book was over 400 pages, but not nearly long enough. I would have gladly wandered the wilderness with the characters for hundreds more.
To the Bright Edge of the World by Eowyn Ivey is a beautifully written historical novel based on an 1885 exploratory expedition to unmapped Alaska.
Lieutenant Colonel Allen Forrester and his wife Sophie have only been married a short time when he undertakes an assignment to explore regions of Alaska’s Wolverine River Valley. He is accompanied by two other Army men. Along the way they meet up with two trappers and prospectors hoping to locate minerals. A Native woman also joins them whose skills prove to be invaluable in their precarious journey.
Forrester’s team experience harrowing, life-threatening situations, illness and deprivation. While he struggles in the wilds of Alaska, Sophie is compelled to remain at their home, an Army post at Vancouver Barracks, Washington Territory. Sophie has always been interested in nature, particularly birds, and discovers within herself a talent for wildlife photography while photography was in its infancy. She converts her pantry into a dark room and manages to learn the art of not only photography, but of developing pictures. Thus, she manages to ease her loneliness, despite the disdain of other army wives who spend their afternoons gossiping at teas.
The diaries and letters of Sophie and Allen Forrester are skillfully paced as they face hardships and conquests. Interspersed with Allen and Sophie’s writings is modern-day correspondence between a pharmacist and a great-nephew of Allen’s who is a curator of an Alaska museum. Also shown are excerpts and illustrations from historical documents which span the time period from the 1880s to the present.
To the Bright Edge of the World is an extraordinary novel, not only in its depiction of “man against nature,” but as a story of love, endurance, and hardships faced with courage and grace.
Set in 1885, To the Bright Edge of the World tells the story of a reconnaissance into the heart of Alaska along the fictional Wolverine River. The small party of five, led by Lieutenant Colonel Allen Forrester, is tasked with exploring the territory recently purchased from Russia. Historically based, yet entirely fictional, the novel comprises an assemblage of journal entries, letters, excerpts from books, photographs, and artifacts. This structure gives the novel the feel of nonfiction and adds elements of mystery and suspense. We are carried along with Forrester and discover Alaska for ourselves with each new adventure.
Bright Edge has everything you could want in a novel: adventure, history, danger, mysticism, romance, thrills, terror, supernatural phenomena, and suspense. The characters are multi-dimensional and well-drawn, people you will come to care about. There is even a deep love story in the relationship between Forrester and his wife, Sophie, who waits at the military camp in Vancouver for his return. From afar, Sophie is touched by a few inexplicable phenomena, forging a mystical connection with her husband. This book makes you feel the magic of Alaska.
Eowyn Ivey’s award-winning debut novel The Snow Child utterly transported me. A second reading, years later, captured me all over again. So when her novel, To the Bright Edge of the World, arrived, I happily immersed myself in her transcendent prose, surfacing only for food and air.
It’s a magnificent tale about pregnant Sophie, who carves out a restricted life in Vancouver while her husband, Col. Forrester, and his team set out for the Wolverine River in 1885 Alaska. The team’s mission? To explore the newly acquired territory and determine potential resistance the indigenous people may launch against U.S. presence.
As if the soldiers are in control. As if anyone can own Alaska.
Through letters, journal entries, snapshots, historical quotes and the like, the explorers recount a journey so harrowing, a landscape so conquering, that their egos and worldviews transform and bow. Col. Forrester and crews’ presumed understandings of geography, tribes, weather, and themselves blur with the unknowable, even the supernatural.
This book transported me into wild, amplified Alaska. Into the vulnerabilities, ingenuities, and regrets of soldiers, and into lives of the intrepid natives they encounter, who endure in a land that spits out those who try to possess it.
Too, I celebrated Sophie, who evades the bounds of society’s expectations for women in that era, and who seeks to understand her child’s gestation, despite interference from a condescending physician. Who forges a professional identity via her photography even as she loves her husband from afar.
This is a grand, majestic, intimate novel, infused with Ivey’s magic in both the settings and people that defy the imagination.
For as long as I can turn a page, I’ll read every book this author writes.
This book was chosen by the librarians in my county as their 2020 Whatcom Reads. I had the pleasure of hearing and meeting the author a couple of days ago. Set in Alaska in the 1880s, it tells the story of an early explorer and his wife and his journey to map an unknown area of the Alaska Territory. What is brilliant about the novel is the elements of magical realism that is infused with the legends of the indigenous peoples of Alaska. These stories are so much the part of where I live in the Pacific NW.
This is historical fiction about an army colonel who leads and expedition in the 1880s Alaska. This trip is unexplored by the United States who has acquired this land. The story moves back and forth from the colonel and the wife he left to fulfill this order. She becomes adept at the new art form of photography. Although fiction it is based on facts. Very easy to read.
In the late Nineteenth Century, a soldier and his new wife are posted to Alaska. His mission is to explore the Wolf River—totally unknown territory. The narrative Ivey spins based on the letters and journals of these two is fascinating. At times terrifying or inspirational, this story offers a wealth of history of the fiftieth state, adventure, romance, and inspiration. I found it un-put-down-able. Ivey is an accomplished writer. Five stars for sure.
I want to add to the above review by someone i have never met, but I agree with. This book about all Alaskans– not just the invaders who claimed territory that had been claimed by Russia. It was full of bits about peoples who had lived there, maybe for centuries and learned how to thrive in one of the planets harsher climates. My favorite was Raven, a character found in many cultures’s stories. It is an adventure, a romance, and a presentation of a country the author understands well. She is a native. And as the previous review noted much of it is true, I can hardly wait for Ivey’s next story.
Interesting portrayal of intrepid explorers and their travails in reaching parts of /Alaska not reached by Americans before. Epistolary style added suspense and romance to story. I learned a lot about the grind of explorers’ daily existence and Alaskan folklore
This a really wonderful book based on a true story. The setting is early US ownership of Alaska and an expedition in to an unknown region. Great characters and an action packed plot
A journey to explore the Alaskan north – similar to Lewis and Clark explorations.
Historical fiction with a strong supernatural/mythic bent, centering around a 19th-century expedition into Alaska. The present-day framing device isn’t strictly necessary, but it helps give shape and resolution to the story, which is structured as a collection of journal entries, news articles and other scraps exchanged by the present-day characters. A unique frontier story.
Another magical deeply layered tale by a master writer!
For adventurers and photographers, this is a love story with great scope. It captures history of the Alaskan territory and so much more. Juxtaposed between the rigors of the frigid north with the challenges of delicate photographic methods, the reader is enmeshed in their story.
The first several pages had me worried: was this going to be one of those tragic tales of male explorers and the bored, lonely wives they left behind? Ick. Thank goodness I kept going because it got better and better, and by the time I was halfway through I couldn’t put the book down. I won’t bother to describe the plot because you’ll find a good description on the book jacket. Just know that I loved it. It’s both magical and has magic IN it. The women’s characters are wonderful. The men’s characters are wonderful. The relationships are wonderful. It was so good that when I finished it I couldn’t bring myself to pick up another book for four days.
Such a beautiful, well written book! Based on history, but with a magical twist.
One of the best books I’ve read this year!
Very well written. One of the best books I’ve read in a long time!
I has become one of my favorites, the author takes time not only with impeccable research but with a clear vision to write a story that will stay with the reader long after the last page is done.
To The Bright Edge of the World is a standalone, historical fiction novel written by the very talented Eowyn Ivey. The genres for this novel expand to the point that it’s nearly impossible to label this piece of work. Regardless, all you need to know is Ms. Ivey tells a story of endeavor, whether it’s going out on an adventure or staying back for one of a different sort. This is far from a happy novel though. Through an epistolary method of storytelling, readers will have a front row seat to trial after trial, a variety of suspense, drama, grief, conflict and emotion, cultural injustice, and the welcomed confusion that magical realism brings to the table…all on the backdrop of a relentless Alaska wilderness that consumes in more ways than one. Although a bit long, the reading experience became an adventure all its own and the title of this book could not be more perfect. Seriously keep your eye on this author.
My favorite quote:
“I’ll tell you one thing about history- we leave a lot of carnage in our wake. The only way we know, it seems, no matter how many times we see it done.”