One woman's journey through trauma, addiction & mental illness.
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village tells the story of a woman unravelling from a traumatic past and her yearning for redemption. When her sister dies prematurely, Clemance-Marie Nadeau leaves her family and village behind, boarding a train bound for Sault Ste. Marie, where she falls under the spell of a charming stranger who promises her a life of adventure, and then holds her captive with her guilt and his threats of violence. Years later, when Clemance moves to the United States, she feels like an outsider, but Clemance is also in exile from herself. Discovering she is pregnant at the age of forty-two sets in motion a series of events that awakens a painful memory, long-buried in her embattled body, and so begins the long and sometimes harrowing journey back to her homeland, and to herself.
Sarah Burns is a gifted writer. Jackfish may have disappeared from the map, but Burns makes it unforgettable. The narrator of this imaginary memoir, Clemance-Marie Nadeau, is a unique individual. The subtle style, effective images, and ambitious structure of the narration draw us into Clemance’s world and make us care about her and those around her. This book is thought-provoking and moving feminist fiction.
—VALERIE RAOUL, Director of the SAGA Centre for Studies in Autobiography, Gender and Age at the University of British Clumbia.
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is a fascinating read! Clemance-Marie’s poignant, harrowing journey back to Jackfish carried me through the gamut of anger, rage, shame, shock, grief and elation. Sarah Burns’s novel is a powerful and moving narration of a woman’s search for redemption.
—TYGRE A. WYNTERS , Author of Love’s Second Chance
Excerpt
On a map it is a jagged, blue wolf ’s head. But if you see the lake with the naked eye, you’ll be entranced by her intensity and
majesty. The water is a firestorm of fury as mighty as any sea. The lake is vast and unforgiving, a fresh-water basin carved into
the ragged rocks of the northland by receding glaciers of ice. Standing on the shores, as I have done many times, you cannot
see the other side. It was named Superior since there is nothing else like it in all of the world. On every map and every globe
I have ever checked, when smaller lakes are absent, it has always been there.
—from Jackfish, The Vanishing Village, by Sarah Felix Burns
Professional Reviews
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village : Old Musty Book Reviews
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is an imaginary autobiography about a woman with a traumatic past and her need for redemption. Sarah Felix Burns has masterfully written a book so eloquent in description, yet so horrifically tragic that the line between beautiful and ugliness becomes blurred in a strangely contradictory way.
Burns did such a magnificent job of telling a story that was wrapped up in a small little village that vanished and using it as a metaphor for the main character’s life. Though I realized pretty early on in the story this was what she was doing, the whole story was woven in such a way the village and the main character’s life became synonymous with each other. The difference between the demise of this small village and the downward spiral of the character’s life is the character was able to re-establish herself.
When I reflect on my experience reading Jackfish, I am utterly amazed at the lack of emotion I had while reading this, but also the intense emotion I had when I finished the book. I had become Clemance-Marie Nadeau from the Village of Jackfish in Canada. I’m not sure the last time that happened when I read a book. Just like the character shut herself off from feeling emotion, I shut myself off also…right after the part in the story that would have caused her to shut down.
Burns wrote Jackfish in such a way, I experienced every thing she was describing. I felt the cold weather in Canada. I felt like I had experienced the brutally horrific rapings. I felt like I was falling into the depths of hell without a lifeline to pull me back up. I seriously had to take a shower after these sections. I completely understood her need to tell someone everything and not wait around for analysis. I understand her reasons for leaving her husband and then wanting him back. I was exhausted when I finished this book.
This was the saddest, most tragic book I’ve ever read. Yet, its one of the only books that has ever touched my soul as incredibly as Jackfish has. I don’t think I could ever read it again, but it will always be on my bookshelf. Have you ever heard Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven? If I had to put this book to music, I would pick Moonlight Sonata. Hector Berlioz is said to have remarked that this particular piece “is one of those poems that human language does not know how to qualify.” This describes exactly my feelings on ‘Jackfish, A Vanishing Village’.
There are few books in this world that tell a story as impactful as “Jackfish, the Vanishing Village”. There are few authors who can tell a story as descriptive and as beautifully as Sarah Felix Burns. I, wholeheartedly, recommend this book. The story deserves your full attention. I suggest you do not attempt to read this book if you have several others you are working on.
Gaggle of Book Reviews
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is a new novel by Sarah Felix Burns, published by Inanna Publications of Canada. The story is a mix of real historical events and places, combined with a fictionized storyline of a woman which reads like a memoir, moving back and forth between the past and the present day. Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is a deeply moving and haunting book that will stay in your thoughts long after you put it down. It is not an easy read, but it is one will help you understand the lives of others, and be grateful for your own life.
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is divided into 4 parts, each section dealing with the emotional growth of Clemance, our narrator and main character. Clemance is trying to cope with a multitude of emotional baggage that all comes to a head when she is taken off her anti-depressant due to an unexpected pregnancy at 42. The book is dedicated to all those who "battle the demons of guilt, shame, addiction, and mental illness", all of which are present in Clemance. Sarah Burns’ writing deftly brings us inside the mind of a woman trying to cope with her present life and her past life, as the demons of her past haunt her daily.
The town of Jackfish, Ontario is was a real town, one that was kept alive through the fishing and logging industries; it was abandoned when trains started using diesel, and no longer needed to stop in Jackfish for coal. Sarah Burns has adapted Jackfish to fit her story, just as she has utilized other real people, places, and events to create a book that feels incredibly real. The rawness of emotion in Jackfish, The Vanishing Village also pulls the reader into the story, Clemance’s story tugs at you.
I had to put down Jackfish, The Vanishing Village a few times during the time I was reading it. Though I am a fast reader, it took several days to read this book; I needed to intersperse it with other, lighter fare. Clemance, her husband Bernie, her friends, and her family are drawn so clearly they jump to life, and the story follows these intense characters. Just as this is not a light read, it is not an easy read, either. Clemance’s life was not an easy one prior to her marriage and pregnancy, and the medication-free pregnancy is triggering memories of those hard times.
Switching back and forth between the present and the past is not easy for authors, nor for the reader. However, in Jackfish, The Vanishing Village, Sarah Burns has written segues that help us understand why Clemance’s mind drifts to the past from the present. The flashback style works so well because we can see inside Clemance’s mind and understand what she is thinking. There are many mysteries locked within Clemance’s brain, though, and we uncover them slowly as she is ready to deal with them. We, the readers, also grow to really like Clemance, and her earlier actions are easier to accept when we have developed a relationship with her.
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is an amazingly intricate and intense book, one that truly feels real. If you are a memoir buff, and are considering reading some fiction, this is the right book for you! If you enjoy women’s fiction or literary fiction, you will not be able to put down Jackfish, The Vanishing Village. If you are very sensitive and easily troubled, I would not suggest this book. That said, I am incredibly glad that I read Jackfish, The Vanishing Village, it put my own troubles into a new perspective, and also helped me understand Clemance’s world, and the world of others struggling with abuse, addiction, poverty, and mental illness. Clemance’s life story is one that I will never forget, one that others should read.
February 29th, 2008 by Rachel Rowe
Caribousmom Book Review
Jackfish, Ontario - located on the northern tip of Lake Superior - is a real place; a place where fishing and coal represented survival until modern technology doomed the town. It is this location where Sarah Felix Burns sets her fictional story, using the barren village with its dislocated people as a backdrop to the story of Clemance-Marie Nadeau.
The novel begins in the middle of Clemance’s life, long after she has left her homeland of Canada and settled down with her husband Bernie in a rural, backwoods Colorado town. The discovery that she is pregnant catapults Clemance into a downward spiral of depression and repressed memories. The novel’s narrative structure alternates between Clemance’s present life and that of her past. She remembers growing up in Jackfish with her alcoholic father, passive mother and many siblings; she recalls her first love - an Indian man with a troubled past and even darker future; and relives her desire to leave Jackfish to follow her dreams. Clemance’s past includes domestic violence and a secret which has eroded her self-worth and the belief that she is a woman worthy of love.
Thematically, the novel centers around the idea of imprisonment. Clemance lives only blocks from a prison, her old boyfriend is jailed, and Jackfish was a site of internment for Japanese Canadians during WWII. These external symbols of the loss of freedom parallel Clemance’s self-imprisonment. She is reluctant to forgive herself, thereby setting herself free to find happiness. The idea of returning to one’s roots, of “coming home,” is also replayed in the novel. It is only through understanding where we come from that we can move forward into the future.
Burns has written a dense book - only 221 pages long - but one which is crammed with emotion. This is a novel about the scars of abuse, the search for oneself, the connection we have to our roots and the road to redemption. Dark and unrelenting, it is a novel which is hard to read. Burns takes her time developing Clemance’s character, and at times I struggled to stick with the book - not because the writing is not wonderful (it is), but because the story is so hard to hear. Eventually, however, this book became impossible to put down. I wanted to know what happened to Clemance; I ached to see her finally realize her worth in a world which challenged her faith in others and in herself; I cared about her.
Burns is a talented writer. She has written a novel of importance to women, especially women who have suffered at the hands of another or who have made choices in their lives they regret. Within the darkness of the subject matter, Burns allows a ray of hope and enlightenment.
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is recommended for those readers who enjoy good, literary fiction and are not afraid of taking a harrowing journey with a character who could be any one of us.
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Reviews for "Jackfish, The Vanishing Village"
Reviewed by Rachel Old Musty Books
4/3/2008
Jackfish, The Vanishing Village is an imaginary autobiography about a woman with a traumatic past and her need for redemption. Sarah Felix Burns has masterfully written a book so eloquent in description, yet so horrifically tragic that the line between beautiful and ugliness becomes blurred in a strangely contradictory way.
Burns did such a magnificent job of telling a story that was wrapped up in a small little village that vanished and using it as a metaphor for the main character’s life. Though I realized pretty early on in the story this was what she was doing, the whole story was woven in such a way the village and the main character’s life became synonymous with each other. The difference between the demise of this small village and the downward spiral of the character’s life is the character was able to re-establish herself.
When I reflect on my experience reading Jackfish, I am utterly amazed at the lack of emotion I had while reading this, but also the intense emotion I had when I finished the book. I had become Clemance-Marie Nadeau from the Village of Jackfish in Canada. I’m not sure the last time that happened when I read a book. Just like the character shut herself off from feeling emotion, I shut myself off also…right after the part in the story that would have caused her to shut down.
Burns wrote Jackfish in such a way, I experienced every thing she was describing. I felt the cold weather in Canada. I felt like I had experienced the brutally horrific rapings. I felt like I was falling into the depths of hell without a lifeline to pull me back up. I seriously had to take a shower after these sections. I completely understood her need to tell someone everything and not wait around for analysis. I understand her reasons for leaving her husband and then wanting him back. I was exhausted when I finished this book.
This was the saddest, most tragic book I’ve ever read. Yet, its one of the only books that has ever touched my soul as incredibly as Jackfish has. I don’t think I could ever read it again, but it will always be on my bookshelf. Have you ever heard Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven? If I had to put this book to music, I would pick Moonlight Sonata. Hector Berlioz is said to have remarked that this particular piece “is one of those poems that human language does not know how to qualify.” This describes exactly my feelings on ‘Jackfish, A Vanishing Village’.
There are few books in this world that tell a story as impactful as “Jackfish, the Vanishing Village”. There are few authors who can tell a story as descriptive and as beautifully as Sarah Felix Burns. I, wholeheartedly, recommend this book. The story deserves your full attention.
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