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the tracks: - a refuge-
Juliette Cameron arrived at The Tracks in Sterling Reserve looking for a place to sleep and another drink. Juliette skippered a fishing boat at age seventeen and gave up on university at twenty-two. In the clear air and well defined shadows of the Nova Scotia autumn of 1951, she occupied an abandoned railcar parked on the wrong side of a broken down bridge. Archie MacKenzie lived in the caboose next door. Lank, Irma and baby Lacie lived down the tracks in an old dining car. They all came to know Juliette's delicate beauty, her fierce strength, and weak resolve. She distrusts loyalty and duty. Principles are just inclinations with a history. She avoids having one man for a long time. That would interfere with having other men for a short time. But Juliette forms bonds with the the Trackers, including Victoria, who arrives inauspiciously in the spring of 1952. Like the steel rails their homes sit on, those bonds are sturdy and resilient.The characters in this novel gobble up life. The Tracks can be steel rail cold or steamy hot.
450 pages, Kindle Edition
Published February 6, 2017
3 people want to read
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September 4, 2018
This is a powerful character driven novel about a group of people many might find difficult to understand or even like. It poses interesting questions of what constitutes a home, explores how a community evolves and describes the bonds that are formed and keep it together. I was quickly drawn in by the characters and found the novel difficult to put down once I began reading.
It is the spring of 1951. “The Tracks” are located in Sterling Reserve, an old mining town where the railroad is owned by the Glover Mining Company, a family owned English Corporation. When the mines closed, five derelict CNR rail cars were abandoned on the spur line on the other side of a broken bridge and people began living there. There was no heat, light or toilet facilities in the cars but the squatters who made their homes there found it a perfect place to establish a home.
Archie Mackenzie lives in the caboose which he has surrounded with a low wooden fence. The windows have curtains, some even have venetian blinds and his yard has raised beds filled with conifers, vegetables, herbs, a small apple tree and some berries. He is a genteel man with a Masters degree who wears suits, ties and polished shoes and sometimes does research for the law firm owned by his friend Cliff, a successful lawyer. He occasionally smokes a pipe, drinks most afternoons and once or twice a month he smokes opium. Archie is happy and has enough work and money for his tastes.
Lank, Irma and their six month old daughter Laci live in the dining car. Lank is a handsome and charming man who can fix cars, do carpentry, plumbing and almost anything when he is sober. Most of the time however, he is drunk. His wife Irma is a wild and beautiful woman. She works hard, cleans houses for a local man with a few sexual favours thrown in and her work gives the couple some needed cash. Irma is playful, sexy and catches the eye of every passing man.
Custard, a man with many aliases, lives in the coal bin and has made several attempts to commit suicide. He keeps having accidents in which young children are hurt or killed. Some believe he is a murderer although no one has evidence to support that claim. No one trusts him. They believe he is not safe to have around and are not happy to have him at The Tracks, but they tolerate his presence.
Ronnie is a driving bootlegger from Cape Breton, a man who gets large quantities of moonshine from a single source and then sells it to others. Ronnie can neither read nor write and has spent time in jail for either bootlegging or beating up customers who refused to pay him for his product.
Juliet Cameron is a pretty twenty-three year from a fishing family in Glace Bay Cape Breton who abandoned her studies at university because she drank too much. She arrives at The Tracks with a bottle in her hand and knocks on Ronnie’s door, looking for someone to share a drink with and a place to stay. She is also pregnant. Ronnie invites her in and after some discussion agrees to sell her the railcar he does not own. It is a good time he thinks, to move on. Juliet is happy with the bargain and settles in to her new home.
Juliet is thinking a good deal about her pregnancy. She doesn’t really like children and knows nothing about caring for them. But she is intelligent and coming from a fishing family, she knows how to work hard. She learned early how to navigate the water and work a crew skippering her first boat when she was only seventeen. Back home she owns her own boat and has an excellent reputation as a skipper. She rents out the boat when she is not using it herself and this provides her with enough income to fund her life as a stationary hobo.
Juliet is open to having sex with anyone and easily walks away from her hookups. She is not interested in long term relationships because they interfere with the short relationships she prefers. Juliette likes Archie and Lank but finds Irma a little wild and doesn’t really trust her. Irma however helps Juliette negotiate her pregnancy which has not caused her much difficulty.
Juliette often makes meals and cooks for the group. The meals are followed by long hours of interesting conversation and often peppered with meaningful philosophical questions. There is always interesting after dinner conversations at Juliette’s and the others enjoy attending.
Juliette worries about having a child to care for and being a reliable mother. She knows children must depend on their parents and wonders if she will be there when her child needs her, especially with all her drinking. As Juliette goes through her pregnancy, she develops a growing affection for Lank and Irma’s little girl Laci who learns easily, is good at almost everything and spreads her affection easily.
When Juliette’s daughter is born she names her Victoria. Laci and Victoria grow up together and remain close, spending their time together because they choose to. They are home schooled and are far ahead of their classmates in their studies. The girls are quite different, Victoria is showy and dramatic, Laci reserved, confident and more self-contained.
As time passes readers are drawn into life at The Tracks, a world very different from the one most readers experience. The setting reminds us that there are people who purposefully chose to live isolated from the rest of society in primitive conditions that few others would tolerate let alone enjoy. It challenges common perceptions about those society calls “the homeless”, those who do not live in traditional housing, are viewed as less intelligent and considered less capable parents. Readers see how these people find ways to live together and compromise even when they might not like each other or enjoy each other’s company. Everyone is different and each learns to put up with the strangeness of the other.
Juliette is a striking woman. You may not always agree with her, but she is wise in many ways and she is a character that is hard to forget.
This is an amazing book about choices. It explores the experience of motherhood, the complexity inherent in mother daughter relationships, the difficulties of finding your own unique path in life and the meaning of home and community. It also reminds all of us not to quickly dismiss that which we see but do not necessarily understand.
It is the spring of 1951. “The Tracks” are located in Sterling Reserve, an old mining town where the railroad is owned by the Glover Mining Company, a family owned English Corporation. When the mines closed, five derelict CNR rail cars were abandoned on the spur line on the other side of a broken bridge and people began living there. There was no heat, light or toilet facilities in the cars but the squatters who made their homes there found it a perfect place to establish a home.
Archie Mackenzie lives in the caboose which he has surrounded with a low wooden fence. The windows have curtains, some even have venetian blinds and his yard has raised beds filled with conifers, vegetables, herbs, a small apple tree and some berries. He is a genteel man with a Masters degree who wears suits, ties and polished shoes and sometimes does research for the law firm owned by his friend Cliff, a successful lawyer. He occasionally smokes a pipe, drinks most afternoons and once or twice a month he smokes opium. Archie is happy and has enough work and money for his tastes.
Lank, Irma and their six month old daughter Laci live in the dining car. Lank is a handsome and charming man who can fix cars, do carpentry, plumbing and almost anything when he is sober. Most of the time however, he is drunk. His wife Irma is a wild and beautiful woman. She works hard, cleans houses for a local man with a few sexual favours thrown in and her work gives the couple some needed cash. Irma is playful, sexy and catches the eye of every passing man.
Custard, a man with many aliases, lives in the coal bin and has made several attempts to commit suicide. He keeps having accidents in which young children are hurt or killed. Some believe he is a murderer although no one has evidence to support that claim. No one trusts him. They believe he is not safe to have around and are not happy to have him at The Tracks, but they tolerate his presence.
Ronnie is a driving bootlegger from Cape Breton, a man who gets large quantities of moonshine from a single source and then sells it to others. Ronnie can neither read nor write and has spent time in jail for either bootlegging or beating up customers who refused to pay him for his product.
Juliet Cameron is a pretty twenty-three year from a fishing family in Glace Bay Cape Breton who abandoned her studies at university because she drank too much. She arrives at The Tracks with a bottle in her hand and knocks on Ronnie’s door, looking for someone to share a drink with and a place to stay. She is also pregnant. Ronnie invites her in and after some discussion agrees to sell her the railcar he does not own. It is a good time he thinks, to move on. Juliet is happy with the bargain and settles in to her new home.
Juliet is thinking a good deal about her pregnancy. She doesn’t really like children and knows nothing about caring for them. But she is intelligent and coming from a fishing family, she knows how to work hard. She learned early how to navigate the water and work a crew skippering her first boat when she was only seventeen. Back home she owns her own boat and has an excellent reputation as a skipper. She rents out the boat when she is not using it herself and this provides her with enough income to fund her life as a stationary hobo.
Juliet is open to having sex with anyone and easily walks away from her hookups. She is not interested in long term relationships because they interfere with the short relationships she prefers. Juliette likes Archie and Lank but finds Irma a little wild and doesn’t really trust her. Irma however helps Juliette negotiate her pregnancy which has not caused her much difficulty.
Juliette often makes meals and cooks for the group. The meals are followed by long hours of interesting conversation and often peppered with meaningful philosophical questions. There is always interesting after dinner conversations at Juliette’s and the others enjoy attending.
Juliette worries about having a child to care for and being a reliable mother. She knows children must depend on their parents and wonders if she will be there when her child needs her, especially with all her drinking. As Juliette goes through her pregnancy, she develops a growing affection for Lank and Irma’s little girl Laci who learns easily, is good at almost everything and spreads her affection easily.
When Juliette’s daughter is born she names her Victoria. Laci and Victoria grow up together and remain close, spending their time together because they choose to. They are home schooled and are far ahead of their classmates in their studies. The girls are quite different, Victoria is showy and dramatic, Laci reserved, confident and more self-contained.
As time passes readers are drawn into life at The Tracks, a world very different from the one most readers experience. The setting reminds us that there are people who purposefully chose to live isolated from the rest of society in primitive conditions that few others would tolerate let alone enjoy. It challenges common perceptions about those society calls “the homeless”, those who do not live in traditional housing, are viewed as less intelligent and considered less capable parents. Readers see how these people find ways to live together and compromise even when they might not like each other or enjoy each other’s company. Everyone is different and each learns to put up with the strangeness of the other.
Juliette is a striking woman. You may not always agree with her, but she is wise in many ways and she is a character that is hard to forget.
This is an amazing book about choices. It explores the experience of motherhood, the complexity inherent in mother daughter relationships, the difficulties of finding your own unique path in life and the meaning of home and community. It also reminds all of us not to quickly dismiss that which we see but do not necessarily understand.
October 2, 2023
I couldn't finish this book. I kind of skimmed it from about halfway. I found the main character Juliette to be really unlikable. They made this drunk woman out to be this gorgeous perfect woman who was good at everything and had everyone in love with her. It got on my nerves. Plus a lot of what was their life at the Tracks seemed unrealistic to me. And the story just dragged on with no real point to anything. Usually I like that kind of book but I guess it was my dislike of Juliette that prevented me from enjoying it. I figured I could find something better to read that wouldn't feel like wasting my time.
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