Trespasser: A Novel by Paul Doiron (Minotaur Books, $14.99, 320 pages)
I could never pass the Montpelier mansion without reflecting that this conflict between Maine’s well-to-do newcomers and people like the Barters had deeper roots than most people understood. Life really is like a tree that way. No one considers how much history is hidden underground.
The setting is the wilds of Maine, the time is current day and the subject is a missing young woman. The narrator of Trespasser is a twenty-five-year-old game warden named Mike who takes his job very seriously. When he’s assigned to investigate a collision between a car and a deer, Mike is left wondering what happened to the driver of the car. He’s a bit more than dedicated; rather, he’s obsessed with hunting down the driver to the exclusion of his girlfriend, Sarah. Sarah has just about run out of patience after spending too much time alone in their ramshackle cottage.
It’s a whole different world out there in the Maine woods. Poachers monitor the police band of their radios in order to swoop in and score fresh deer meat. Bored bullies race around private property on all-terrain vehicles destroying trees and land. The locals and the summer people are very different in both their view of life and their finances. The contrast is portrayed in well-written prose by author Paul Doiron. He’s an expert on his subject because he’s not only a writer; he’s also a Registered Maine Guide who enjoys the outdoors.
The general feel of this book is gritty and highly detailed. Mike is considerably more mature than most twenty-five-year-olds and his vocabulary is quite extensive. Perhaps Doiron wants it that way, or maybe he is just not able to turn down his intellect and his Yale education. Regardless, the book is very engaging and caused this reader to stretch a bit when the charm of the tourist side of Maine was peeled away to reveal the hard-scrabble existence lived by the natives.
Well recommended.
Ruta Arellano
A review copy was provided by the publisher.
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