Canada's Far North Examined in New Novel by Nowick Gray

VICTORIA, British Columbia - Feb. 9, 2015 - PRLog -- Five Rivers Publishing is pleased to announce the release of a fascinating murder mystery, Hunter's Daughter, on March 1, 2015, by British Columbia author, Nowick Gray.

To say Hunter's Daughter is a mere murder mystery cannot begin to encompass what impressed publisher, Lorina Stephens, with this novel: the sharp writing, tense plot, deliciously detailed cultural and environmental surround. This is a tightly-wrought novel that speaks with authority about the ambiguities of culture and region.

The Premise

Northern Quebec, 1964: Mountie Jack McLain, baffled by a series of unsolved murders, knows the latest case will make or break his career. Eighteen-year-old Nilliq, chafing under the sullen power of her father in a remote hunting camp, risks flight with a headstrong shaman bent on a mission of his own. Their paths intersect in this tense mystery charting a journey of personal and cultural transformation.

The Author

Nowick Gray has contributed short fiction and essays to a variety of periodicals and anthologies since 1976, when he received his MA in Canadian literature from the University of Victoria. His first book-length literary publication, the time-loop adventure novella Rendezvous, was released in 2013, followed by three more titles in 2014: PsyBot, a speculative novel of virtual reality, and two collections of shorter works infused with magic realism, Strange Love / Romance Not For Sale and My Country: Essays and Stories From the Edge of Wilderness

Much of Nowick's writing draws from his two decades homesteading in the interior mountains of British Columbia. Other adventures include teaching for three years in Quebec Inuit villages -- an experience from which the forthcoming mystery novel Hunter’s Daughter arose -- and indulging a lasting passion for West African drumming, as a student, teacher and performer. Nowick currently works as a freelance copy editor and makes his home in Victoria, BC, with winter travels in warmer locations.

The Cover

Again the genius of Jeff Minkevics shines through in this cover. The Ungava region can be very bleak, particularly near pack-ice. As a contrast to that the novel revolves partly around a young woman, Nilliq, who often refuses to wear the traditional bird-skin tunic of the Inuit women in the correct fashion: feathers in, for warmth, and in this way the tunic becomes a metaphor for Nilliq's rebellion. And so it is Jeff Minkevics chose to reveal Nilliq beneath the tradition of the feathers of the bird-skin tunic, and against the harsh, unforgiving background of Canada's far north.