Review: Jackfish, The Vanishing Village
Sarah Felix Burns' Novel About One Woman's Longing to Go Home Again
Feb 7, 2008
Clemance-Marie Nadeau is a woman with a past. Living in a small Colorado town, she longs to go back to the place of her childhood: Jackfish, Canada. But much like the saying goes, you can't go home, especially when home is now a deserted ghost town. Clemance is wrought with the demons of her past and constantly seeks out the days of her youth as a source for renewed stability and redemption.
Amid the separation from her husband, her unemployment and her recently discovered pregnancy at the age of forty-two, Clemance finds herself lost and without any sense of direction. She spends the majority of her time confined inside her home, a self-imposed exile, reflecting on her tumultuous past. The sources behind her depression and anger are slowly revealed, as Clemance's life is painstakingly recalled.
A History of Violence
Clemance’s vulnerabilities are gradually exposed, beginning with the hardships of her childhood. Growing up in a poor family with an alcoholic father, she quietly blended in with her siblings. Except for a major turning point in her relationship with her older, musically gifted sister, her childhood remains solemn and ordinary.
With the onset of adulthood, Clemance longs to escape her small, secluded town and she does so with the help of a charming man who convinces her to move with him to the United States. Leaving her family and friends behind, she falls captive to this man who eventually treats her in the most inhumane of ways. She spends a year of her life under the most extreme and depraved conditions of physical, emotional and sexual abuse imaginable. Finally with the help of a cousin, she is able to bravely escape her captor and cross the border back to Canada.
Starting Over
Unbeknownst to her at the time, she can’t go home to Jackfish for fear of her abuser finder her. Even if she could, her beloved homeland is no more. Clemance resorts to using and abusing drugs and alcohol to escape the memories of her personal torment. She only hits rock bottom after making a shocking discovery that forever changes the course of her life. She carries the burden and guilt of this secret with her for the rest of her life.
Eventually, life turns around slowly for Clemance as she meets her future husband, Bernie and decides to once again leave Canada to live with him in Colorado. She tries with diffulty to acclimate herself to American life, but constanly longs for the familarity of Canada. While this relationship takes a much different path than her previous one, she is still carrying the memories of her past with her, which stands in the way of her ability to truly love and trust Bernie.
A New Beginning
After finding out she is pregnant, she asks Bernie for a separation, in the hopes of facing her demons head-on and alone. Through the course of her pregnancy, she learns that everything she has been trying so hard to come to terms with stems from her upbringing in Jackfish. No matter where she goes, no matter whom she chooses to love, she is still that little girl in Jackfish, Canada, for good or bad.
Sarah Felix Burns’ novel truly takes the reader on a rollercoaster ride of emotional circumstances: anger, depression, guilt, pain and ultimate redemption. Its fast-paced highs and lows are balanced out by the unfolding mystery of Clemance’s past. Keep a box of tissues by your side for this one, and enjoy the ride!
Book Stats
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village by Sarah Felix Burns.
Paperback, 224 pages.
Inanna Publications & Education, 2007.
ISBN 0978223330.
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