Black Bear: A Story of Siblinghood and Survival

by Trina Moyles

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

A dazzling memoir about one woman's coexistence with bears in the boreal forest and a singular meditation on sibling loss.

When Trina Moyles was five years old, her father, a wildlife biologist known in Peace River as “the bear guy,” brought home an orphaned black bear cub for a night before sending it to the Calgary Zoo. This brief but unforgettable encounter spurred Trina’s lifelong fascination with Ursus americanus—the most populous bear on the northern landscape, often considered a nuisance to human society. As a child roaming the shores of the Peace in the footsteps of her beloved older brother, she understood bears to be invisible always present but mostly hidden and worthy of respect. Growing up during the oil boom of the 1990s, the threats in the siblings’ hard-drinking resource town were more human, dividing them from a natural reverence for the land, and eventually, from each other.

After years of working for human rights organizations, Trina returned to northern Alberta for a job as a fire tower lookout, while her brother worked in the oil sands, vulnerable to a boom-and-bust economy and substance addiction. When she was assigned to a tower in a wildlife corridor, bears were alarmingly visible and plentiful, wandering metres away on the other side of an electrified fence surrounding the tower. Over four summers, Trina begins to move beyond fear and observe the extraordinary essence of the maligned black bear—a keystone species who is as subject to the environmental consequences of the oil economy as humans. At the same time, she searches for common ground with her brother on the land that bonded them.

Impassioned and eloquent, Black Bear is a story of grief and a vision of peaceful coexistence in a divided world. It captures the fragility of our relationships with human and nonhuman species alike, and the imperative to protect the wild—along with the people we hold closest.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, Nature, Biography Memoir

Audible Audio

Published January 6, 2026

Reviews

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Moyles's third nonfiction work is intimate in its focus on her relationships with her late brother and with black bears, yet expansive as it surveys contemporary human–bear interactions and ponders fear, solitude, conflict, and loss. In her second year as a fire tower lookout, she began to recognize individual bears and give them names. The evolution of her attitude is evident from the language she used for the animals: in Year One, she wrote "its"; by Year Two, it was "her." Black Bear is so restrained and varied that I wouldn't define it only as a bereavement memoir. Its focus is wider; it's a clear-eyed nature book with a social conscience. Indeed, I most treasured Moyles's passion for the environment and explanations of how climate change will increase conflicts with wildlife.

See my full review at BookBrowse. (See also my related article on bears in Indigenous cultures and legends.)

[Mona · Rating 5 out of 5]

A captivating memoir, Trina is a lovely story teller, her honesty and ease in writing made this book a pleasure to read.
Trina is brave in so many levels. The book was heartfelt.

[Geraldine Giffen · Rating 4 out of 5]

It started slow…. Excellent read

[Melissa Rae · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful literary memory that turns what we know about our relationship with black bears - and about our relationships with those closest to us - on its head. I couldn’t put Black Bear down once I started; Trina’s writing gently pulled me from page to page. This is a book that will linger long after you turn the final page.

[Laurie Burns · Rating 4 out of 5]

I listened to this on audio, and thanks to @libraFM for the copy.
The author reads the work and she does a great job.

I didn't know much about this going in, other than it was Canadian and about a brother and sister sibling pair. As someone who comes from a brother and sister sibling pair I love reading about that relationship.

But it is a lot more!
This memoir has a lot going on, but never too much, everything sort of ties back together.
It is about the province of Alberta, oil sands, and Indigenous relations.
It is about bears and nature.
It i about substance addiction and depression.

It is about being afraid to "break the peace" with your own family on differences of opinions.
It is a mediation on being okay with who you are.
And it is about grief.

A lovely and fulfilling, worth it memoir in which I learned a lot.

[Ashley Easingwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truly one of the best books I have read. This memoir beautifully weaves the stories of bears and siblinghood together naturally. It is thought provoking, and written so well that you can almost smell the dandelions or coffee as you watch the bears, or sit at the kitchen table, together with the author. It is heartbreaking and hopeful, a balance that is hard to do well and Trina knocks it out of the park. This is one of those books that will live with you for a long time if you let it, I know it will for me.

[Annika Phillips · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely, utterly remarkable. Trina is an incredible storyteller- I’m not sure I have ever been so captivated by a memoir. The book only gets better and better as it goes on. Her take on “these difficult ecological times”, the importance of family, the reality of being human and the need to care for our planet hit me deeply. This book is so important right now.

[Amie Mak · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a slow moving read but I did end up enjoying the book in the end. The way the author weaves together her observations of black bears with reflections on human nature felt thoughtful and deeply personal. Her writing creates space to slow down and reflect without pressure or heaviness.

[Tiana · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great memoir, and I know this really isn't the main point of it, but there were a lot of parts in this book that offer a very unique perspective on "would you rather be stuck in a forest with a man or a bear?"

[Daniel Brisbin · Rating 5 out of 5]

best book I've read in a long time

[Danielle · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5⭐️

[Yousief Al-Naseri · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phenomenal

[Valerie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Clear, thoughtful, poignant.