People of the Whale
People of the Whale[1] is a 2008 novel by Linda Hogan about a Native American man with a supernatural ability to breathe underwater who is forced to come to terms with his experiences in the Vietnam War.
The novel draws on real-world conflicts over indigenous water rights. Hogan based the fictional A'atsika community in the novel on the Makah, who by treaty had been granted rights to hunt whales and seals in the Neah Bay region, but faced opposition from animal rights groups when they resumed hunting in 1999.[2]
Reception[edit]
Kirkus Reviews called the novel "portentous and didactic", writing that it "excels, early on, in laying out tribal lore" but that "the abstract, preachy voice palls".[3]
References[edit]
- ^ Hogan, Linda. People of the Whale. W. W. Norton & Company, 2008. ISBN 978-0-393-33534-7
- ^ Smith, Lindsey Claire; Holland, Trever Lee (2016). ""Beyond All Age": Indigenous Water Rights in Linda Hogan's Fiction". Studies in American Indian Literatures. 28 (2): 56–79. ISSN 1548-9590.
- ^ "People of the Whale". Kirkus Reviews. June 15, 2008.