Elephant Winter

The appealing protagonist of this engaging first novel (published in 1997 by Viking in Canada) learns the language of elephants, creating a dictionary of elephant speech to support her theory that elephants communicate not unlike humans, expressing happiness, grief, anger, joy, contentment and melancholy. Sophie Walker is 30 when she returns home to southern Ontario from Zimbabwe to care for her dying mother, a wildlife painter whose unconventional life has inspired Sophie to pursue her own career as a world-traveling art teacher. Challenged by a harsh Canadian winter and the daunting role of caregiver, Sophie responds eagerly to the attentions of rough-hewn Jo Mann, the elephant keeper at a neighboring tourist park, and signs on as barn hand. They fall in love, and soon Sophie discovers she's pregnant. Enter Alecto Rikes, a sinister animal physiologist, whose academic ambitions eclipse his humane instincts, and who seeks to perform an elephant autopsy at any cost. When a male pachyderm turns violent, Alecto kills him, saving Jo's life but breaking his spirit. Seriously wounded, he leaves Sophie to deal with her mother's death and the impending birth of their child. In a poignant twist, a grieving female elephant is the only source of emotional support for Sophie. Echlin's solid devotion to detail makes for an original and engrossing narrative. In prose both eloquent and controlled, she fearlessly links the often anguished sanctity of the mother/daughter bond with the spiritual affinity humans can feel for animals. (Apr.) FYI: Echlin completed her doctoral thesis on Ojibway storytelling. She has lived and traveled in France, the Marshall Islands, China and Zimbabwe. Currently, she resides in Toronto, where she has produced TV documentaries for the CBC.