Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Grayling
    Grayling
    Grayling
    Ebook105 pages1 hour

    Grayling

    By Gillian Wigmore

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    After surviving a health crisis, Jay heads to the remote and challenging Dease River in Northwestern BC for a canoe and fishing journey, but is unprepared for the mysterious stranger who becomes his passenger. A lean and intense tale that takes the reader to haunting depths. A seminal and brilliant addition to a neglected genre. Destined to become a Canadian classic.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMother Tongue Publishing
    Release dateApr 1, 2014
    ISBN9781896949475
    Grayling
    Author

    Gillian Wigmore

    Gillian Wigmore is the author of three books of poetry, (most recently Orient, Brick Books, 2014) a novella, (Grayling, Mother Tongue Publishing, 2014), a novel (Glory, Invisible Publishing, 2017), and Night Watch: The Vet Suite (Invisible Publishing, 2021), a trio of novellas. A health communications officer, she lives and works on the traditional territory of the Lheidli T'enneh in Prince George, BC.

    Read more from Gillian Wigmore

    Related to Grayling

    Related ebooks

    Psychological Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Drowning in Reverse

      Jun 4, 2020

      Drowning in Reverse
      8 min read

    • Article

      Faces Across America

      Mar 1, 2021

      Faces Across America
      6 min read

    • Article

      Ghosts of Pine Island

      Jun 18, 2019

      Ghosts of Pine Island
      12 min read

    • Article

      Lost Souls

      Jun 3, 2021

      Lost Souls
      9 min read

    • Article

      Tali

      Dec 15, 2019

      Tali
      3 min read

    • Article

      Under The Paddling Pool

      May 5, 2022

      Under The Paddling Pool
      3 min read

    • Article

      The Road to Paradise and Back

      Dec 1, 2022

      The Road to Paradise and Back
      23 min read

    • Article

      Ride Of Passage

      May 17, 2021

      Ride Of Passage
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Last Ruby- Throat

      Oct 12, 2019

      The Last Ruby- Throat
      3 min read

    • Article

      Ride Of Passage

      May 17, 2021

      Ride Of Passage
      5 min read

    • Article

      Crawling Around In The Dark

      Dec 1, 2023

      Crawling Around In The Dark
      4 min read

    • Article

      Farewell my Love

      Dec 12, 2019

      Reminiscences from NZTODAY founder Allan Dick For those who don’t know much about me, I have spent the past half-century writing about cars. I fell under the spell of the motor vehicle when I was 10 years of age. Firstly I collected pictures, cut fro

      6 min read

    • Article

      Beautiful In The Distance

      Jun 24, 2019

      Beautiful In The Distance
      10 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      Jul 1, 2019

      Ray spit in my hand. Motor oilleafed on still water and he spoke over mesaying I waver when I issue commands.He kicked the drowned cat to shower mewith its pocket of brown lake.Said I wasn’t worth the fuss I madeshowing the boys their loneliness in t

      3 min read

    • Article

      Speak, Water

      Apr 1, 2021

      Speak, Water
      7 min read

    • Article

      ‘One Damn Fine Month’

      Apr 24, 2018

      ‘One Damn Fine Month’
      7 min read

    • Article

      Now I Lay Me

      Sep 9, 2021

      Now I Lay Me
      13 min read

    • Article

      Dude’s Last Hunt

      Jul 17, 2023

      Dude’s Last Hunt
      6 min read

    • Article

      Following The Flow

      Aug 31, 2019

      Following The Flow
      11 min read

    • Article

      Slaloming to Freedom

      Jun 25, 2020

      Slaloming to Freedom
      11 min read

    • Article

      Anna

      Feb 5, 2018

      Anna
      7 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Grayling

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Grayling - Gillian Wigmore

      GRAYLING

      GRAYLING

      A NOVELLA GILLIAN WIGMORE

      MOTHER TONGUE PUBLISHING LIMITED

      290 Fulford-Ganges Road, Salt Spring Island, B.C. V8K 2K6 CANADA

      www.mothertonguepublishing.com

      Represented in North America by Heritage Group Distribution.

      Copyright © Gillan Wigmore 2014. All Rights Reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher—or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from Access Copyright, the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency, info@accesscopyright.ca—is an infringement of the copyright law.

      Grayling is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

      Book Design by Mark Hand

      Front cover painting: Dease River, 2013, acrylic on board, 16 x 20 by Annerose Georgeson

      Typefaces used are Chaparral, Corbert and Steelfish.

      Printed on Enviro Cream, 100% recycled

      Printed and bound in Canada.

      Fish image in the book is of a Grayling.

      Mother Tongue Publishing gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Province of British Columbia through the B.C. Arts Council and we acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, which last year invested $157 million in writing and publishing throughout Canada. Nous remercions de son soutien le Conseil des Arts du Canada, qui a investi 157$ millions de dollars l’an dernier dans les lettres et l’édition à travers le Canada.

      LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA

      CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

      Wigmore, Gillian, 1976-, author

      Grayling/Gillian Wigmore.

      ISBN 978-1-896949-37-6 (pbk.)

      ISBN 978-1-896949-47-5 (Epub)

      I. Title.

      PS8645.I34G73 2014     C813’.6     C2014-900517-2

      for thirty-three

      Table of Contents

      GRAYLING

      Acknowledgements

      GRAYLING

      When he set out on the first of the small lakes that would eventually become the river, the slight current in the water was barely discernible and the scrubby bushes leaned out from the bank, casting their shade far across the water. The only sounds were the calls of birds, his own clothing rubbing together, the ceaseless drone of mosquitoes, and the occasional bang of his paddle on the aluminum gunwale of the canoe.

      He was alone. The canoe was heavy with his dry-bags and his food barrel. It was a wide, steady canoe, but jittery from his nerves and his inexpert movements. It felt slippery beneath him, but as he continued to paddle, he started to feel stronger and the flutter under his breast-bone became less from fear than from excitement.

      All he could see were trees and water: stunted black spruce and aspen, their leaves still green but on the cusp of turning gold. Reflected in the still water of the lake, he saw lumpy clouds in the sky. He saw the near shore, the far shore and his own hands on his new paddle. Once he’d crossed the first lake, he looked for the creek that would lead him to the next lake. He inspected with trepidation the narrow green tunnel formed by the shore willows over the slow-moving creek. After months of planning, nights imagining what descending the Dease would entail, he could finally feel the pull of the current. He nosed the canoe onto the shady creek, into the dark, then emerged moments later in the light.

      As he began to cross the larger lake, he studied the far shore for the break in the trees that would be the river head, where the water would slip the bounds of the lake and begin its run. Though the current all but disappeared on the lakes, he could feel a momentum building with each paddle stroke. He understood for the first time that he had begun the trip and there was no going back. He looked behind him and saw the shore already so far away that individual leaves were no longer noticeable on the trees. He tried to find the mouth of the creek he’d come down, but the shore was so thick with overhanging trees and shadows, he couldn’t tell where he’d been. He faced forward in the canoe again. There was only what was ahead of him. He breathed deeply in through his nose and let his breath out slowly and pulled his paddle through the water again.

      He had driven for two days to get here—first on a four-lane highway, past farms equipped with machines that watered the fields by the quarter section; then on a smaller two-lane highway through the outskirts of small cities, past gas stations and convenience stores on the edges of small towns. There were long unbroken stretches of forest; hours went by when he saw no houses or truck stops. Logging trucks passed him with loads that towered over his small truck and the borrowed canoe strapped to the roof racks.

      When he’d seen a sign that said Next Gas 200 km, he pulled in at the jumbled mass of buildings at the highway junction—a weather-beaten gas station with a convenience store attached: Hot Food While You Wait, Diesel, Farm Gas, Engine Oil. He parked and got out of the truck and stood in the heat of the hazy mid-afternoon sun stretching his arms above his head, shaking the ache out of his legs from sitting so long. He looked around: trucks ahead of him at the pumps; rigs parked close together near the diner, truckers smoking on the running boards; a camper with a scowling woman in the passenger seat.

      When his turn came to fill up, he removed the gas cap and selected the lowest grade. Two kids with popsicles sat on a concrete berm watching him. He stared at the moss growing out of the gas bar median as the tank filled. The kids seemed about eight or nine, with bare feet and black hair. They kept their eyes on him but said nothing, their tongues busy with the cold pink ice. Liquid from the melting popsicles dripped down their brown hands. He wondered where their parents were and glanced around for them outside the store, but then he stopped and focused instead on the business of hanging up the nozzle and tightening the gas cap. They continued to stare, but he ignored them. He felt the itch of days without a shower, and when he moved, he heard the stiff fabric of his new jacket rustle like plastic packaging. He’d wondered if the boys heard it, too.

      He paid inside the store, then got back into the truck and pulled out, turning right on the highway, heading north. He drank the coffee even though it was bitter, enjoying the heat of it as he grimaced through each swallow. He drove until the hum of the truck’s tires on the highway was like the beating of his own heart, it was so abiding and familiar. He turned the dial on the radio, and he heard a faint newscast at eleven o’clock, just as the sun set in a final gasp of green light through the trees.

      The light lingered as he pulled over in a rest stop to sleep in the cab. He used the concrete outhouse, leaving the door to the dank room open so he could breathe fresh air while inside. He skirted an overflowing garbage can in the growing dark, sure a bear had ravaged it, and hurried back to the truck. Inside, bundled in his sleeping bag, he listened to the mosquitoes whine at the windows. It was a lonely sound—a sound so deep it felt as if the north echoed with it, as though beyond the trees there was nothing but more trees, and in the deep boreal green of the forest, more mosquitoes whined. Eventually the air cooled, the mosquitoes disappeared for the night, and he relaxed into sleep.

      In the morning, he was up before the sun and drove on again down the empty highway. It was another five hours of dusty monotony before he got to the Dease River bridge. When he finally saw the hand-lettered sign directing him to the resort, he drove down the dirt road and arrived at a cluster of tidy white cabins on the shore of a small lake. He parked the truck near the cabin marked Office and sat for a moment in the cab looking out. He opened the door but stayed still and listened: a chickadee called in the bush behind him, and he heard the ascending notes of another songbird’s call near the water. Then he began to hear it all: the hum of cicadas in the heat, the barking of a dog near the office, the red-winged blackbirds in the marsh behind the resort. The sheer, carefree volume of the birds lifted the hair on his arms, and he shivered. No one knew where he was. He listened

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1