Washika: A Novel

It’s the 1960s and 21 testosterone-drenched high school graduates are bussed into Washika Bay, a company logging camp where they will work for the summer. Idealistic, confident, and sometimes troubled, the young men meet their matches in tough older bush workers and cope with a devastating forest fire, sand flies, and leeches. Henri Morin is particularly sensitive and, though a hard worker, appears to harbor dark thoughts, and another young man’s moving love story is carefully told. In no other place could the transition from adolescence to adulthood be the same. Through its characters and their experiences, this book has revived an era and inspired new life into a wild and beautiful place.