Caribou Island

Author(s): David Vann

New Travel

On a small island in a glacier-fed lake on Alaska's Kenai Peninsula, a marriage is unravelling. Gary, driven by thirty years of diverted plans, and Irene, haunted by a tragedy in her past, are trying to rebuild their life together. Following the outline of Gary's old dream, they're hauling logs out to Caribou Island in good weather and in terrible storms, in sickness and in health, to patch together the kind of cabin that drew them to Alaska in the first place. Across the water on the mainland, Irene and Gary's grown daughter, Rhoda is starting her own life. She fantasizes about the perfect wedding day, whilst her betrothed, Jim the dentist, wonders about the possibility of an altogether different future. From the author of the massively-acclaimed "Legend of a Suicide", comes a devastating novel about a marriage, a couple blighted by past shadows and the weight of expectation, of themselves and of each other. Brilliantly drawn and fiercely honest in its depiction of love and disappointment, David Vann's first novel confirms him as one of America's most dazzling writers of fiction.


Product Information

David Vann was born on Adak Island, Alaska, and spent his childhood in Ketchikan. His first work of fiction, Legend of a Suicide, was originally published in 2008. It won seven literary awards and was selected for twenty-five 'Books of the Year' lists including the New York Times.

General Fields

  • : 9780670918447
  • : Penguin Books Ltd
  • : Viking
  • : 0.194
  • : August 0000
  • : 198mm X 129mm X 18mm
  • : United Kingdom
  • : January 2011
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : David Vann
  • : Paperback
  • : 1
  • : English
  • : 813.6
  • : oc2010088063
  • : 304