Review
First time novelist Stef Penney
shook the British literary world last year when she
won the Costa Award (formerly Whitbread Award) with
The Tenderness of Wolves, not least because
she has never been to Canada and carried out all her
research in the British Library. Although at first
glance it might seem surprising that an author could
write with such authority about a place she's never
been to, it should be noted that no one alive at this
time has been to 19th century Canada either! So,
whether she carried out her research by leafing
through pages in the British Library or wandering
through the trees of Northern Ontario is, arguably,
a moot point.
Having said that, often when an author writes
about a place purely on the basis of...
Beyond the Book
One plot thread of
The
Tenderness of Wolves
involves an artifact that may or
may not have belonged to the
Five Nations.
The Five
Nations, collectively known to
themselves as the Haudenosaunee
(People of the Long House), but
better known today by the
derogatory term given to them by
white settlers, Iroquois meaning
rattlesnake, are a group of
Native American tribes
consisting of the Seneca (People
of the Great Hill), Cayuga
(People of the Great Swamp),
Onondaga (People of the Hills),
Mohawk (People of the...
