“Show; don’t tell,” novice writers are told, a cryptic rule which leads some of them to wail, “What does that mean?” Were I teaching an introductory creative writing class, I would use this book as an example.
The first 70 pages (Part I of the book) are almost entirely “telling”. The events preceding the main story are summarized: “The year after Will took over the entire Jameson tract, Owen fell in love with a whimsical, emotional girl named Lula Brower.” So much for falling in love, meat for any number of entire novels. Characters’ motivations, which writers are told to “show” through their actions and reactions, are laid out in plain, declarative sentences: “Nolan was certain of his position and did not like being challenged.” And imagery is made explicit, rather than leaving it for the reader to notice: “These were the gnarled and toughened trees. Like the men, they came to root in tough soil and could not be easily defeated.”
However, as with all rules, once you understand the “show; don’t tell” dictum, you may break it for effect, which is what Richards does here. This is the story of a logging family and the men who work for them in the harsh, 30-below woods. It is also the story of the townspeople whose opinions shift with the wind of rumors born of boredom, envy, greed, or pride. Richards’ incantatory narration is not only appropriate for these simple souls, but also puts the reader at a distance from the story, reminding us that it happened a long time ago (just before and after the Great War) and far away (New Brunswick in the Maritimes), making it over into a legend, something that has been handed down in the oral tradition. The forces that drive the story—unscrupulous labor barons and the damage done by irresponsible rumors—match those common to the stories of that time as well.
Two brothers are left to run their father’s lumber company after his early death, first Will, the golden boy who knows the woods and the trade, and then Owen, the frail, bookish younger brother who wants to read a million books. Once the groundwork is laid, Richards proceeds to show just what life in a lumber camp is like, harsh and brutal. He names the men and their roles: the “Push” who oversees the work, the “tend team” who feeds the horses, and the teamsters who work them: the Belgians, Clydesdales and Percherons. Some of the fallers use axes; some use saws to cut down the great trees, but none of them realise that that in a handful of years, they, their tools, and the horses will all be replaced by the mechanisation that is coming.
Richards takes great risks here, even as his woodsmen risk their lives and horses every time they race downhill in front of sleds carrying tons of timber. When he talks about the men or describes walking through the virgin woods at night with no guide or lamp but instinct and memory, he is not afraid to sound as sentimental as a Stephen Foster song. Many times I found myself thinking Ah, too bad; now he has ruined the book such as when he gives a twist to the title partway through. Yet, like the men hauling logs too heavy and working hours too long for any human to survive, Richards pushes on with his blunt, sometimes even clumsy sentences, refusing to give up. And he brings it off. Inevitably, ineluctably, he carries us away with him into this world and leaves us shaking with the wonder and the tragedy and the humanity of it all.