Kirsten Murphy
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Feb 09/01) - Readers diving into James Bastedo's first work of fiction will find themselves eating blueberries with a 700-pound grizzly bear who calls the Barren Lands home.
Tracking Triple Seven, published by Red Deer Press, is scheduled for a spring release.
The innovative novel follows the life a grizzly bear tagged with the satellite collar 777. Chapters switch between the voice of Triple Seven, her cubs and various humans working for a mine.
The book's genesis came while Bastedo, a noted science writer and self-proclaimed environmental evangelist, worked as a bird biologist for a diamond company in 1995.
"I wanted to tell a story but I wanted it to be accurate and realistically reflect the way animals live, as much as a human can," Bastedo said.
"I was very careful not to anthropomorphize (giving human qualities to animals) and there's a chapter where I go into the bear's mind and the reader experiences the bear's joys and fears as it claims its place in the wilderness."
One of his favourite chapters to write was the delivery of bear cubs in a subsurface Tundra den.
"I tried to paint the picture of a newborn bear cub not much bigger than an overgrown chipmunk, blind and toothless. It's an example of where you get inside the head of a newborn cub -- a squirming little blob."
The 200-page novel, based on fact, will appeal to anyone from the age of 10 to 110, especially people fascinated by the Arctic Tundra.
Bastedo cautioned against discussing the book in detail given its pending spring release.
The novel hinges on a descriptive account of a world seldom seen by people where environment clashes with the economy.
Already at work on his next book (about snow), Bastedo spent the last two years talking to elders and scientists while writing Tracking Triple Seven.
He remains as indebted to Mother Nature as he does to the people who shared stories with him.
"They really are an unsung creature in North America. We have these Disneyized versions of mountain grizzlies and coastal salmon-swiping bears. We have these stereotypes of these savage ... beasts and they're so much more."
