Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson PDF Free Download

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Book overview

   Monkey Beach is a supernatural mystery novel written by Eden Robinson. It was awarded the 2001 Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize and was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Governor General’s Award for English-language fiction. Her second book, Monkey Beach (2000), is a novel set in Kitamaat territory and follows a teenage girl’s search for answers to and understanding of her younger brother’s disappearance at sea. It was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Governor General’s Literary Award, and received the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize.

   Eden Robinson’s debut novel, Monkey Beach, is a coming of age story, gothic adventure novel, portrait of the Haisla community, and critique of effects of colonial violence in Canada. It follows Lisamarie Hill on a quest to find her younger brother Jimmy, who is lost at sea. Robinson draws on Haisla mythology and pop culture to weave a story of a family and community supporting and antagonizing each other as they negotiate traumas of both the past and present. Critics have variously read the novel as a coming of age story, gothic adventure novel, portrait of the Haisla community, and a critique of effects of colonial violence in Canada.

Summary of Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson

   Lisamarie Hill is a feisty young woman who has supernatural abilities and is led on a journey to understand her brother’s disappearance and come to terms with her identity. Robinson uses location and animal symbolism to weave the culture of the land into the story, using animals as symbols of the ancestors or warnings from the spirit world. The most important details in Monkey Beach are that crows are used as symbols of luck and warning for Robinson’s characters. Jimmy’s belief that crows are a symbol of luck leads to his success in competitions. Spotty, Jimmy’s favourite raven, alerts him to the danger his sister is in.

   Lisamarie had encounters with crows playing a part in her spiritual visions. Ravens and crows are also important symbols in Haida mythology, representing both the trickster and the creator of the world.

   Lisamarie Hill and her parents, Gladys and Al, receive a life-changing telephone call from the coast guard when their son Jimmy and his co-worker Josh have gone missing at sea. Through these recollections, Lisa learns about her family, including Uncle Mick, Aunt Trudy, Ma-ma-oo, and the tension between Western culture and Haisla tradition. Jimmy’s disappearance prompts Lisa to think more about him, remembering how they would swim together at the beach and the town pool, where Jimmy eventually honed his abilities and became a competitive swimmer. Lisa has a special “gift” that distinguishes her from other children. She is visited by a little man with red hair each time before a tragedy hits her family. Her mother has suppressed her gifts to fit in to the modern way of living.

Love Like the Ocean

   The crows in the greengage tree speak to the narrator in Haisla, meaning “Go down to the bottom of the ocean”. The narrator had too much coffee last night and the clock-face has an Elvis clock. The narrator smokes their first cigarette of the day and an orange cat pauses at the beach. The narrator has been dreaming about the ocean for the last week. Weather reports are favourable for the area where Jimmy’s seiner went missing.

   Jimmy is a good swimmer, but his skipper, Josh, is heavily in debt and has had a bad fishing season. His cousins have been spreading rumours that Josh might have sunk his Queen of the North for insurance, but Aunt Edith glared at them. The narrator’s father is smoking and his ashtray is overflowing.

   Lisa hears crows talking to her and her mother suggests she needs Prozac. Her father’s VHF is tuned to the emergency channel, and she watches his cigarette burn down in the ashtray. A woman calls the Prince Rupert Coast Guard, who has an overdue vessel and a gillnetter that should have been in Rupert four days ago. During land claims talks, some of this territory is claimed by both the Haisla and the Tsimshian nations, but once you pass the head of the Douglas Channel, you are firmly in Haisla territory.

   In the 19^th century, Hudson’s Bay traders used Tsimshian guides to show them around, leading to confusion between Kitamaat and Haisla. Alcan Aluminum built a “city of the future” for its workers and named it Kitimat too, but spelled it differently.

Review

   Eden Robinson’s first novel, Monkey Beach, is a psychological thriller with supernatural overtones. It follows 19-year-old Lisamarie Michelle Hill from Kitamaat Village as she searches for her missing brother Jimmy and his boss Josh in the Douglas Channel between Prince Rupert and Bella Bella on British Columbia’s northwest coast. The disappearance of Jimmy triggers Lisamarie’s memories of other lost loved ones, such as her favorite uncle, Mick, her grandmother Ma-ma-oo, and a childhood friend who recently committed suicide. It offers insights on loving families, sibling rivalry, scapegoating, fear, aggression, sexuality, alcohol and drug abuse, grief and anger, and the connection between grief and anger.

   Lisamarie has inherited spiritual power from both sides of her family, and her grandmother helps her cope. Lisa begins to demonstrate her powers by bringing lovers together, finding the lost, detecting abuse and crime, and when Jimmy goes missing, she takes it upon herself to seek assistance from her spirit helpers.

   Monkey Beach marks the transition of an oral tradition into a written literature, where the role of the shaman passes to the writer. Robinson is the focus of criticism from all sides, as cultures in transition experience a confusion of authority. She risks self-censorship if she chooses to leave out important parts of the truth. Winter dances and inductions into mysteries are still available in many First Nation communities today. Robinson’s book Monkey Beach misleads readers by leaving out an avenue of spiritual training and cultural guidance.

   The title misleads readers away from Haisla territory and sends them away from the magic world of Earth, Sky and Water. Robinson should self-censor to protect once-secret activities or present a misleading picture, but rather to hold something back for the next novel.

Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson PDF Free Download