Tanya Reimer's Ghosts on the Prairies: A Sacred Land Story was published by Elsewhen Press as an e-book in July 2014. The printed edition was published in October 2014.
Information about Tanya Reimer:
Born and raised in Saskatchewan, Tanya enjoys using the tranquil prairies as a setting to her not-so-peaceful speculative fiction.
She is married with two children which means among her accomplishments are the necessary magical abilities to find a lost tooth in a park of sand and whisper away monsters from under the bed.
As director of a non-profit Francophone community center, Tanya offers programming and services in French for all ages to ensure the lasting imprint and growth of the Francophone community in which she was raised. What she enjoys the most about her job is teaching social media safety for teens and offering one-on-one technology classes for seniors. She is very active in her community, volunteering to teach eReader classes, as president of the Ladies Guild, as treasurer of the Cemetery Board, and as vice-chair for the Library Board. She is also the secretary for the School Board.
Tanya was fifteen when she wrote her first column. She has a diploma in Journalism/Short Story Writing. Today, she actively submits to various newspapers, writes and publishes the local Francophone newsletter for her community, and maintains a blog at Life's Like That.
Click here to visit the author's blog.
Information about Ghosts on the Prairies: A Sacred Land Story:
"Respect others, respect yourself, and respect nature." - The law of the Ghost tribes
Some things are worth a fight. Strong words that Antoine’s father drilled into him.
After his father mysteriously vanishes one night, Antoine must find another income or he risks losing the Sacred Land that his father swore to protect.
Working on a ranch, Antoine meets Emma, a victim of underground slavery. Fighting for her freedom costs him his home, his sister, his best friend, and puts in question all of his values. If he succeeds, will she and her son fit into his world?
The prairies of 1916-19 come alive with bootleggers, slavery, fools in sheets, haunting spirits, shifty tunnel runners, and even exploding churches. Ghosts on the Prairies is alternative history suspense incorporating the paranormal and infused with romance.
This suspenseful and beautifully written story concerns the interwoven loves, hopes, dreams and tragedies of lives lived in backwater towns and isolated farmsteads of the US-Canadian border lands, where hard work, lawlessness and harsh, summary punishment are a way of life. A network of secret underground tunnels, linking the controlled and controlling world to the south with the Sacred Lands of the Ghost tribes across the border to the north, offers the possibility of escape and freedom.
"Using a light touch, Tanya's story draws on spiritual beliefs and mystical traditions and deals with the dark, lingering shadow of slavery; with racism, sexual abuse and religious intolerance; with the corrosive effects of all-consuming greed; with exploitation; and with the clash of cultures, concerning the nature of ownership."
A REVIEW OF TANYA REIMER'S GHOSTS ON THE PRAIRIES: A SACRED LAND STORY
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to read a novel about what can happen on the prairies between USA and Canada? If you have, now is your chance to quench your curiosity, because this novel is a fascinating and harsh vision of life and death on both sides of the border.
Tanya Reimer's Ghosts on the Prairies: A Sacred Land Story is a bit different kind of a speculative fiction novel, because the events in this novel take place on the US-Canadian border lands and prairies. The prairies provide an interesting setting for the events, because bad and rough things happen on the peaceful prairies and in the dark tunnels beneath the ground.
Ghosts on the Prairies is both a touching love story and a survival story. It's an exceptionally interesting story about love, romance, slavery, bootleggers, tunnel runners, greed, racism, curses, souls and spirits. It's a bold combination of many different elements, but all of the different elements compliment each other. Tanya Reimer seamlessly combines these different elements and weaves an interesting and believable story that's full of life, passion and cruelty.
Here's a bit of information about the story:
The novel begins when Antoine, Emma and Charlie are escaping through the tunnels to the Depaix land where they'll be safe... Then the story skips two years before that time and the readers see what Antoine does at the Clement Ranch where he works. Men are interested in Antoine's land and want to buy his land, but Antoine doesn't intend to give it up, because it's a sacred burial ground for his mother's tribe. Antoine falls in love with Emma and wants to protect her from the brutalities that she has had to endure...
I'm not going to reveal more information about the story, but I'll mention that the journey towards the end is both thrilling and interesting, because many things happen to the characters. The story is well told and it's full of happenings.
Here's a bit of information about some of the characters:
- Antoine Depaix is a man who has a few debts and he has to pay them off. He looks after the Depaix land and protects it from outsiders. He works on the ranch and falls in love with Emma. He knows what's right and what's wrong, and he wants to protect Emma.
- Emma is a slave and she has been treated badly by the owners of the ranch. She's a victim of slavery and many bad and brutal things have been done to her. Her life begins to change when Antoine promises to take her away.
- Clement is the owner of the Clement Ranch. He's a mean man and wants to have Antoine's land for his own use. He wants Emma to give him a son. He has been cursed and thus he has to learn a secret between a father and a son.
As the story begins to move forward, readers will learn more things about Antoine's life and family. His fight for freedom costs him a lot and he has to question his values. He's an interesting character, because he's a Francophone and his life isn't easy (he fights for what he believes is right).
Readers will also notice that the lives and fates of Antoine, Emma and Clement are partly linked together and the author explores what happens to them.
The author writes about the relationship and blossoming love between Antoine and Emma in a good way. She fluently tells about their feelings for each other and how they begin to fall in love despite the difficulties that they face because of their relationship. I think it's great that the author shows that everything isn't as easy as it could be and people have to fight for what's right.
In my opinion the author has a realistic way of writing about slavery and what kind of bad things were done to slaves. In this novel, Antoine sees what has been done to Emma and he has an emotional response to these cruelties. Emma has suffered abuse - and also sexual abuse - when she's been with Clement, because Clement has used her to satisfy his own needs. Emma's life isn't her own, because she belongs to Clement.
It's easy to see that Tanya Reimer has spent a lot of time doing research about history and Francophones, because everything feels authentic and believable. There's nothing artificial about the happenings and that's a good thing, because there are a few new novels and stories that suffer from artificial storytelling when authors have tried to blend historical elements with speculative fiction in a bad way. Fortunately, in this novel everything works well and all the pieces fit perfectly together.
Although Ghosts on the Prairies is basically an entertaining and quite a fast-faced novel, it offers a lot of food for thoughts. It contains thought-provoking happenings and certain scenes that will linger on the reader's mind. This is interesting, because normally this kind of novels don't have such scenes in them. For example, it's difficult to forget what happens when Antoine visits his sister.
The author writes fluently about cultural differences. She handles such difficult issues as racism, different nationalities and slavery in a surprisingly bold and gritty way, but doesn't overdo anything. She shows what slavery has done to slaves and how slaves react to kindness after being treated badly. She also shows how little the slaves mean to their masters and how easy it is to dispose of sick and unwanted slaves.
Tanya Reimer also writes about bootlegging in a thrilling way. She tells of the tunnels that are used by bootleggers and she shows how far men are willing to go to earn money. Because greed and money mean a lot to certain men, they're willing to do extreme things to get what they want.
Ownership issues are handled well in this novel, because the author writes about how men try to take the land away from Antoine and how slaves belong to their masters and have no rights. The author doesn't shy away from this kind of difficult material, but shows how cruel the world can be to people who are not like everybody else.
It was fascinating to read about men's reactions to Antoine's cultural heritage, because his background and cultural heritage didn't please all men. In my opinion the author wrote surprisingly well about Antoine's problems and his feelings towards Clement and other men, because Antoine didn't approve of certain things.
It's interesting that Tanya Reimer writes about the healing power of nature and earth. Many other authors probably wouldn't have touched this issue, but I think it's great that she infused her story with a few scenes in which these issues and other closely related issues are handled in an interesting way. For example, there are characters in this novel who have the Sight and can see things that others are incapable of seeing.
In my opinion Ghosts on the Prairies is something a bit different and it will thrill all readers who want to read a story that's full of life and turmoil. It's a welcome addition to the ever growing list of interesting and different kind of speculative fiction novels that offer something different for readers.
I look forward to reading more novels and stories written by Tanya Reimer, because based on this novel I can say that she is capable of writing intriguing speculative fiction. It'll be interesting to see what she writes next and how she develops as an author.
I can recommend this novel to speculative fiction readers and mainstream readers. I think it's possible that readers who normally read only mainstream fiction will find this novel intriguing, because it's an accessible novel and contains many different elements that will fascinate readers.
If you've read novels and stories in which the happenings take place on the prairies and have liked what you've read - or if you've ever wondered what it would be like to read a story that takes place on the prairies - you should take a look at Tanya Reimer's Ghosts on the Prairies. It's something different and it offers good entertainment for readers.
Good, gripping and thought-provoking entertainment!