These stories carry the reader to an Alaska that lies at the end of homestead trails and fishing docks, people with gimpy fishermen, cannery workers up from California, and Mum and Dad "slugging it out on the rockpile." It"s country that"s both real and illusory, steeped in violence and forgiveness, mythic in its proportions. Mitchell has keen eye for natural details and an imagination that turns the dust of dirt roads and the fog of early mornings into magic curtains; you can never be sure what you"ll find on the other side. It Alaska stands as a frontier dividing the commonplace from the dreamed-of and shadowy, Mitchell is the explorer who leads us across the border. It"s a trip well worth taking with him.