Not Really an Alaskan Mountain Man
by Doug Fine
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Book Summary Information
Author: Doug FineEdition: Paperback
Format: Illustrated
Published: 2004-09-01
ISBN: 088240590X
Number of pages: 224
Publisher: Alaska Northwest Books
Book Reviews of Not Really an Alaskan Mountain Man
Book Review: As Homer said to Garrison, "Be funnier!"
Summary: 3 Stars
Doug Fine has given us a collection of essays from his first year or so as an urbanite living in rural Alaska. He groups these around three "steps": finding warmth, obtaining food, and building shelter. I think they're supposed to be funny, along the lines of (say) David Sedaris, and they are indeed intermittently funny. But they need to be funnier to work that way.
In fairness, some of the chapters are not intended to be funny but to be travelogues of a sort. For example, he joins an Inuit family on a whale hunt on the ice and tells us what that's like. I think this was the most successful story because Fine's a good observer and he's willing to make fun of himself along the way.
The least successful story comes at the end, when Fine joins the community in rebuilding a neighbor's house that had burned down. He never quite figures out what the point of this story is, and let's face it, holding up drywall all day doesn't really lend itself to thrilling or humorous narration. It reads more as if, "I've committed to this three steps structure in my book, and so I must talk about building shelter at the end."
As this last point may suggest, Fine doesn't have a lot of material in this book. It's not a good sign when you take several basic ideas (using a chain saw for the first time, joining Inuit on a whale hunt) and split each one across two chapters. Each of these topics needed to be tightened up to fit in a single chapter, with a new essay on a different topic put in the place of the deleted chapter.
I realize that I've been pretty critical here, and I should mention that Fine is a talented writer, and the book is a very pleasant read despite its weaknesses. In addition, Fine comes across as a very likable guy - - and that's important in a book like this because you're essentially along for the ride with him.
Summary of Not Really an Alaskan Mountain Man
Now here's a formula for near disaster: East Coast big-city guy, world-traveler, jounalist, and otherwise politically savvy fellow settles down in rural Alaska, where men are many and manly, and women with survival skills are good to count among your friends. He wants to fit in. But how does one learn to be a Mountain Man? By observing, imitating, and making near-fatal mistakes, that's how. The choices a boy has to make. Eat processed food or on-the-hoof food, learn to operate a chainsaw or freeze to death, figure out what a bunny boot is or lose a few toes, and by the way, which end of he barrel points up? This is the story of Doug's first difficult winter in a one-room cabin, trying to stay alive and come out of it with some semblance of Alaska cool. With side-splitting, self-depreciating humor, Doug shares his attempts to elevate himself past his perpetual state of greenhorn-ness by aligning himself with tough sourdoughs to someday claim the title of manly Mountain Man.General Books
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