The Big Both Ways

Cold Storage #1

by John Straley

Fleeing a logging camp after an accident kills a coworker, Slip Wilson's life changes forever when he meets Ellie Hobbes, an anarchist from Seattle who is on the run with a dead body in the trunk of her car.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery Thriller, Audiobook, Thriller, Historical Mystery

350 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 2008

About the author

Novelist John Straley has worked as a secretary, horseshoer, wilderness guide, trail crew foreman, millworker, machinist and private investigator. He moved to Sitka, Alaska in 1977 and has no plans of leaving. John's wife, Jan Straley, is a marine biologist well-known for her extensive studies of humpback whales.

Reviews

[Terri · Rating 4 out of 5]

As much as I like and respect John Straley, not that I know him well, I have read his novels of Cecil Younger with a touch of exasperation. I have a knee-jerk reaction against novelists that portray Alaskans as quirky throwbacks to whatever time isn't now and I am not terribly receptive to a style of writing that is more poetry than prose. Mind you, I am fully aware that both of these characteristics are in large part responsible for the success of John Straley novels, nevertheless...

Having said that, I loved this book. The setting was the Pacific Northwest and southeast Alaska, during a time in history that is not generally embraced and/or publicized, the period of violent struggle between big business and labor unions. It was full of interesting characters whose quirks were accepted, by me, as being a result of actually living in a "time that isn't now." They became who they were and reacted as they did due to the difficult and turbulent era in which they lived. The prose did not aspire to poetry. It was beautiful in the way that the hands of a hard-working man or woman are beautiful. It was no-nonsense, workmanlike, but showing experience and skill in creating a world that I wanted to remain in for much much longer.

[Sam Reaves · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title refers to the Inside Passage up the west coast between Washington and Alaska, a big river that flows both ways. That's the setting for this picaresque tale of an unemployed logger, a female political agitator and a little girl with a pet bird who in 1935 take to an open boat to flee from Seattle after a murky intrigue that leaves a couple of bodies in car trunks. The cops and the strikebreaker thugs pursue them northward as they encounter threats of the natural and human varieties, getting a panoramic view of Depression-era miseries in a region of spectacular beauty along the way.
The book suffers just a little from its attempt to be both a crime novel and a tale of seagoing adventure; the exposition is a little disjointed in the murder mystery aspects. But it's vivid and absorbing as a survival tale and a portrait of deprivation and social ferment in a region most of us will only see from the comfort of a cruise ship, if ever.

[Stacey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this, so 4.5 stars. It's historical fiction and a prequel to Cold Storage, which is a hoot. This is not a hoot--it's spare and heartbreaking.

In 1935, Slip, Ellie, Ellie's young niece, Annabelle and her pet bird, Buddy, escape bad juju of Ellie's making in Seattle on a dory, and head to Alaska. This is the story of how they got on that dory, the journey, and the aftermath. I loved the writing style, sort of a marriage of Ivan Doig and John Steinbeck.

[Steve Visel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one had to grow on me but in the end I enjoyed it thoroughly. The characters were well drawn, if not particularly likable. The storyline was gritty noir and well-developed, and the author did a great job evoking 1930s Southeast Alaska. I listened to the Audible version and the narration was generally good, though narrator Barry Press took great pains to. enunciate. each. word. clearly. [SPOILER] Straley did a great job tying up all the plot strings that was the ending was a little happier than I would expect in a gritty crime noir.

[Tori Thompson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was pretty wildly different from the John Straley books I've read so far (Cold Storage, Alaska and The Woman who Married a Bear). Aside from being set pretty far back in the past, it was also much more bleak and spare and bitter. The characters felt pretty flat, with much less of the strangeness of the characters in Cold Storage. The plot was often convoluted and improbable to an extent that really took me out of the story many times.

That being said, I really did enjoy this book. I'm really not sure what it is about Straley's writing that keeps pulling me back in when I definitely otherwise would've closed the book and not thought of it again. I thought it maybe had to do with his lyrical, almost-purple, nearly-mythic prose, but The Big Both Ways is almost entirely devoid of that. And I usually have very little interest in road trip books, but that was a huge bulk of this story (though most of that time is spent in a boat, rather than a car). Still, I just really liked this book: its building up and then unraveling of a mystery; its commentary on mid-1930s communist movements and union uprisings; and especially the parallels it drew between this desperate and determined cast of characters, and the zany, wacky hijinks of Cold Storage, Alaska. It almost didn't work as a prequel because the tones were so vastly different, but the connections it made at the end were really touching and emotional for me, having so recently read the other book.

So, yeah, long story short: I like this author's work a lot, I'm still not sure why I do, but I'm going to keep reading to find out.

[Shawn MacDonald · Rating 4 out of 5]

I first heard of this book in an e-mail that has daily e-book deals. I wasn't familiar with the author, but the description was interesting. This is how I find a number of books that I read. Because I prefer physical books to e-books (and because I don't mind saving the money), I looked it up and it was available from my local library (had to be brought in from another library, but that usually takes just a few days).

Anyway, as I started reading the book, I liked it, but wasn't overly enthusiastic about it. I don't mean that as a criticism because the book is very well written, but compared to say, the last John LeCarré novel, I was liking it but it wasn't like I couldn't put the book down. That was when I started reading it, though. As I got deeper into the book, it really built and the story and the characters drew me in more and more. I'm not a particularly fast reader, but I clipped through the second half of the book in just a few days.

By the time I got to the end of the book, as much as I hate the cliché, I didn't want it to end. Straley has written a really excellent book and that kind of pisses me off because it means now I have to read more books by him and I already have SO MANY BOOKS to read.

[Matt Heavner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not at all what I might typically read, and it took me a bit to get into it. But I loved this story and the narrative and of course, the Seattle/PNW/SEAK setting!

[Tex · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually 3.75 stars but the setting was so new to me that it was far more interesting than the plot. Set after WW1 on a dory traveling up the western coast of Oregon to Alaska—a former logger, a revolutionary woman looking to form unions, a pre-teen girl, and her yellow bird in a round cage. It was dirty, gritty.

[Sherry Tamone · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book of John Straley! A great tour of Southeast AK and the characters are familiar to me

[Patricia Vroman · Rating 5 out of 5]

If this were a movie, it would be a black comedy. What a unique book! A logger quits after his friend dies. All he wants is a piece of land to work on and live peacefully, but he is trapped by a young woman who is damaged physically and mentally and on the run from crimes to which she is an accessory. The trio which includes the woman's niece and yellow parrot set out in a series of adventures together and separately, from Seattle into the Inland Passage of British Columbia and Alaska. All kinds of quirky things and sometimes awful things happen. The ending was definitely different. Loved it and occasionally groaned at it.

[Annabelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good mystery read set in the rough and tumble Northwest and Alaska passage soon afher the Gold Rush and during the US depression. Straley is a young author who is also the writer laureate of Alaska, who takes his intimate, kinesthetic relationship of the Inside Passage to Alaska (also known as the big both ways, since the current flows north and south) to create a rich and vivid setting for three humans on the run. Slippery has farmed in eastern Washington, but looses the farm when his father dies, he is a great carpenter, but has to work in logging to get by. He saves $2,000 to go to Seattle, find his friend and buy a stake. But a beautiful blonde, a Red, a labor organizer catches him off guard and embroils him in her life of espionage with labor, security, the police, and mine owners. Murders abound, and the two are on the run with her niece, Annabelle, the only sane one, who studies, loves a yellow bird and has the courage to save both of them at times. Straley is a dense writer, with vivid descriptions which capture the hardships of being poor during the depression, the corruption of the mine owners, and the beauty and unforgivingness of the landscape.The character development was particularly good, with the main characters having believable actions and trajectories, and clear differences between them. I liked it.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fabulous historical mystery set in the Pacific Northwest and Alaska during the 1930s when trade unions and Communism were duking it out. Ellie is a Red with a heart but she's in trouble with the big boys -- one of them is lying dead in her trunk. Slip leaves his lumberjack job and hitches a ride with Ellie and things all go downhill from there. Eventually they both have to run so they take a tiny boat up the Inside Passage to Juneau, chased by police and bad guys all the way. The book has funny moments, and is evocative of the weather and scenery of the PNW -- but the mystery holds all the way to the end -- you don't even know if Ellie's a good guy or a bad -- you just have to get to know her!

[Jenine · Rating 3 out of 5]

I prefer Cold Storage, the crummy yet cosy village story, over this noirish march up the Pacific Northwest. I did appreciate the street level view of labor issues in the mid '30s. I think that's the best part of the book. I didn't much enjoy being stuck on a small boat with these characters, cold and wet for most of the time. Might have been worth it for the description of raking a fire aside on the beach so they could sleep on the warm dry sand. That was delightful to imagine. Far too much cold salt water.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

I gave this novel a rare -- for me -- five stars because it hit me on so many levels. It is a crime story set in the Pacific Northwest in the 1930s. The writing, plot, and characters are all first-rate. I felt like I belonged in this world.

[Amber · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked Cold Storage way better but this was still an above average book. It just suffers from sibling competition, I'm afraid.

[Lynette · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 --- just when you feel like everything you read is exactly the same, along comes John Straley with his quirky characters, rich settings, twisty plots... :)

[Avid Series Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Big Both Ways by John Straley is a mystery/adventure set in the Pacific Northwest in 1935; fictional characters set in the backdrop of actual events in the historic violent struggle to form labor unions (for example, the Pinkertons appear as strike-breakers).

Slip Wilson left his parents' farm in the Dust Bowl to find work. Big, strong, and hard-working, he did well as a logger in the Pacific Northwest, saving a nest egg for his future. He dreams of owning his own property and business. When his best friend and fellow logger dies in a logging accident, Slip decides it's time to go build his dream. Hitchhiking his way to Seattle, he catches a ride with Ellie Hobbes. Once he realizes she's involved in a crime, he wants to go his own way - but she tricks him into helping her.

In Seattle, Slip meets Ellie's young niece Annabelle and her pet bird, Buddy. Slip joins Ellie at a labor union committee meeting, where violence erupts. Once again, he attempts to go it alone, this time in a dory; Ellie and Annabelle catch up just as he departs. Together, they flee the criminals that are pursuing Ellie (and now Slip), tackling the Puget Sound in a tiny boat.

They soon learn the 'Big Both Ways' is the nickname for the Inside Passage, whose flow changes direction with the tide. Slip, Ellie and Annabelle are no match for the fierce current in a small dory. They accept help from a man piloting a larger boat - until he tries to kidnap Annabelle. Slip and Ellie work for a time in a cannery - where hazardous conditions have tragic consequences for Ellie.

In a parallel plot, a detective from Seattle also travels north, to solve the crimes Ellie and her anarchist cohorts committed back in Seattle.

The working conditions illustrate the dire need at the time for labor reform, however the criminal acts of union organizers reveal dark motives. Slip and Ellie's journey runs the gamut from gritty and depressing, to gripping and exciting. They finally reach Alaska, where the detective catches up to them, in a difficult to understand labor standoff, followed by a surprising conclusion.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Cold Storage Alaska" was my introduction to John Straley. I'm just now getting to the prequel, and I found it to be a solid noir novel, without the Northern Exposure vibe I found in CSA.

The action in this novel is set in Washington, the Inside Passage, and Juneau in 1935 and focuses on the labor movement - Wobblies, "Reds", strike breakers, corrupt union bosses, and a significant amount of violence - so be warned that this is much darker than Cold Storage. The town figures hardly at all in the story.

The characters are much more complex than the good guy/bad guy stereotypes. You are left in doubt until the end as to whether you are pulling for a pair of killers or a couple of people caught up in the violence of the environment in which they struggle. Okay, the detective and the little girl are clearly "good guys", but are far from being one-dimensional.

Some of the rescues along the Inside Passage journey have a bit of the deus ex machina to them, but this is forgivable.

I've started giving myself permission to pass on sequels and completism with respect to a given author, so based on summary and reviews, I don't plan to read the 3rd Cold Storage novel, "What is Time to a Pig". Feel free to tell me why I should reconsider.

[Ezekiel Benzion · Rating 4 out of 5]

A modern monomyth (aka a hero's journey) that immerses the reader into the 1930s Northwest and Alaskan pioneer outposts in the throes of the Depression. The "hero," Slippery Wilson, dreams of building a home with a family and has left a logging job to set out to do so. In the interim, he meets up with a captivating Communist agitator, Ellie Hobbes, and her precocious niece, Annabelle, and becomes caught up in a journey of murder and mayhem, meeting good and evil characters along the way. As the adventures unfurl, we meet all sorts of archetypes: the compassionate shippers, the down and out workers, the corrupt employers, and the diligent lawmen who are out to find out the truth of the murders that began in Seattle while seeking to destroy the private police forces that are thugs for the mine and cannery owners. A well-written adventure novel although the wrap-up that leads into a second book seems too sudden after all the in-depth writing.

[Timothy Grubbs · Rating 3 out of 5]

A historical road trip caper with characters more interesting than the mystery itself

The big both ways by John Straley is very much an ensemble novel following a group of eccentric, troubled, or criminal characters as they intersect, travel, and try to succeed from the Pacific Northwest to Alaska.

As I read this I felt it was a genre mashup of a Quentin Tarantino film and the Fargo franchise. The rustic setting felt similar to Fargo’s Dakota/Minnesota corridor, while the characters and storytelling felt like Tarantino’s style with quick backstory scenes and dialogue. You could also use the historical offshoots of the Yellowstone franchise.

The novel does a decent job establishing the mindset of characters with the rise of socialism, the end of prohibition, pre-world war II, various aerial achievements (such as Lindbergh and Earhart), and other elements.

Decent thing to check out…

[Flo · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first book in the Cold Storage series by John Straley, who is a hell of a good writer. Here he tells the story of the founding of this town in Alaska and 4 people who end up traveling there. Slippery Wilson is a carpenter who is looking forward to a quiet life in 1935, but meets Ellie Hobbes, a political activist who gets involved with agitators, anarchists, communists, strike breakers, killers and murderers. Most of the book is taken up by the backbreaking, awful journey the 2 take to Alaska in a tiny little dory boat together with Hobbes' little niece and with the long arm of the law on their tail. Utterly fascinating.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good story, characters with depth, a plot that kept me wanting to read what came next, a mysterious woman with secrets and a hidden agenda, a genuine good guy in the wrong place at the wrong moment, or was it the right place at the right moment (?), a smart young girl (that I met as an old lady), a dory, Alaska, good people and bad people, justice, and escape from justice, and of course, a bird, fun read. I found this long after reading Cold Storage, which I enjoyed, but felt did not fulfill the potential that it started with, but this book did. Nothing great, I just really enjoyed reading this book.

[Kathy Piselli · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like while reading Paddling North, after awhile I felt I was developing sympathetic backache and blisters on my hands. I do not know why it took so long for these desperate characters to figure out that they needed to stop fighting the considerable tides of the Inside Passage. This was an exhausting story of a chase into unknown lands and waters, with violent union gangs and unionbusting gangs, helpless victims, but also with a canary. There was a lot of tension mixed in, even in the descriptive parts. Such as the narrative at the Dixon Entrance about the ball of hundreds of small silver fish boiling to the surface, chased by a salmon, which is in turn chased by a seal.

[J · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good grief! Lemony Snicket’s orphans have nothing on Slip Wilson and his series of unfortunate events. John Straley draws you into the achingly painful lives of his characters. They tumble out of one misfortune into another and you can help but root for them while completely expecting the worst. And, damn do you really need a hopeful ending for this one.

[Eileen Breseman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Set in the time of the Wobblies in Seattle (1930s), it's a well told story of mystery, murder and escape on the Inside Passage. The characters they meet are interesting as is the story. I could relate to some of this same geography because of a trip I've taken in a small boat recently . Cold Storage, AK is barely part of the story, but we have a small cabin in this fictionally named town. I encountered Mr. Straley's book in the cafe store there.

[Mark Valentine · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know which is stronger in this novel, the plot, or the characterization. The plot takes impossible turns, jams up, eddies, swirls like a neap tide, and pivots. The characters are lively, witting, gritty, and knowable.

Straley has an eye for detail, place, and scene. I also appreciated his flip attitude with smooth similes. Straley deserves a chair at the table of the Pacific Northwest novelists: David Guterson, Jess Walter, Sherman Alexie, Jonathan Evison....

[Erika Youngberg · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a ride!
John Straley is a storyteller. Keep that in mind as your read the book, because this happens and then this happens and then this happens. There’s not a lot of showing (as in the old writing saying “Show, don’t tell,) because he is a storyteller.
That being said, it’s a compelling story, and it’s set in one of the most beautiful and wild places on earth (Southeast Alaska), so I enjoyed it.

[Linda Gaines · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great story with a man, woman, girl and bird travelling to Alaska by small boat. It's set in the '30s with violence between unions and Reds. The characters are so real and the ending is set for another novel, Cold Storage (AK). I read that first so it was revealing to see the back story for the girl, Annabelle.

[Lulu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Geesh…talk about violence…though, unions in those days and some since have always been about violence and corruption just as management has been crooked as they come. Straley, what a great storyteller. Didn’t much care for Ellie but the girl and the guys were terrific characters, the kind you can empathize with and almost understand.

[Susanne · Rating 2 out of 5]

I loved that this book was about the Pacific Northwest and a trip up the Inside Passage. I never thought of it a a river than ran both ways… brilliant. However, this book was about as inspirational as The Grapes of Wrath. Bleak. Sad. Hopeless. Annabelle and her bird, Buddy, who I hear are the stars of the show in the next book, Cold Storage, kept me reading.