In 1992, the Atlantic magazine published "Ichthyology," a short story by Alaska-born David Vann, then a graduate student at Cornell University. An tale based on Vann's father, a depressed dentist turned halibut fisherman, it revealed an exceptional talent. But Vann was a long way from being famous.
It took another 18 years before a major American publisher took on his novel, "Legend of a Suicide," in which "Ichthyology" is the first story. The book came out in England in October.
In a matter of weeks it had garnered more critical acclaim than any Alaska literary work since Jack London's mythic "To Build a Fire." Reviewers likened Vann to Ernest Hemingway and Cormac McCarthy. "An American classic," said London's Sunday Times and others chimed in: "Fantastically well written." "A truly great writer." "Nothing quite like this book has been written before."
In January, a French translation went on sale and the French response was even more enthusiastic. France Inter dubbed it "a masterpiece." Le Figaro called Vann "one of the best writers of his generation."
The new U.S. edition, from Harper Perennial, went on sale on March 16. On Wednesday, The New Yorker magazine picked it as its book club selection for this month. Movie rights have been acquired by actor Christopher Meloni of "Law and Order." It will be released in eight languages in 50-some countries over the next few months.
If fame hasn't quite knocked on Vann's door yet, it's clearly walking down the right street.
SHAME AND GUILT
Vann was born in the Aleutian Islands at the Adak Naval Air Station, Oct. 19, 1966. The family moved to Ketchikan for a few years before relocating to California. Vann's parents divorced soon after that move. His father returned to Alaska and Vann spent vacations with him in Kodiak, Kenai, Anchorage and Fairbanks.
Growing up, Vann regaled friends with stories of his childhood in Alaska. But he didn't recount everything.
"For three years I didn't tell anyone my father killed himself," he recalled. "I said it was cancer."
Vann's father invited him to spend a full year with him in Alaska when the boy was 13. "It would have meant spending my whole 8th grade year in Fairbanks.
"I said no."
Two weeks later, James Vann committed suicide.
Shame and guilt weighed heavily on his teenage son. He wrote about it in a recent essay in the Huffington Post:
"Perhaps it was the violence of what my father did, taking off most of his head with a .44 magnum pistol... And what he did seemed to transfer to me... What he had done made me dirty."
In "Sukkwan Island," the novella at the heart of the book, Vann imagines how things might have gone if he'd said yes. From the first page, the reader gets hints of the father's manipulativeness, how he blames others for life's failures, his ineptness as a mechanic and woodsman.
The twist of history that erupts in the middle of this story, which makes up 3/4 of the whole book, and the frantic psychological flogging that ensues is one big reason why reviewers have found themselves out of breath while reading the piece.
Even the author didn't see what was coming when he started to write the story. The bombshell event -- we won't give it away here -- "was an authentic surprise and shock to me," Vann said. "That's the power of fiction."
His previous book, a non-fiction account of the sinking of a charter yacht, "A Mile Down: The True Story of a Disastrous Career at Sea," was a national best-seller and "a fast read," he said.
"But it doesn't take off in any particularly compelling way. I think the fact that ('Sukkwan Island') is a true story that's been transformed into fiction gives it appeal in other places." Like France.
"Fiction can deal with material more strongly than memoir. It can address all those demons because fiction reveals the unconscious pattern and momentum building in the piece."
The mythic quality represented by the southeast rain forest, where the action takes place, is also a factor, he said.
"Everyone in the world, basically, has an interest in Alaska and wilderness. The desolation and sense of exile speak to a common human experience, the kind of despair that my father was going through before his suicide."
OVERSEAS HIT
As an adult, Vann split his time between serious writing, shipbuilding and seafaring.
But even with his credentials as a published author, contributor to Atlantic, Esquire, Outside and other major magazines, plus his post as an assistant professor at the University of San Francisco, Vann's attempt at fiction seemed as snake-bit as the yacht in "A Mile Down."
"I worked on ('Legend of a Suicide') for 10 years and for the next 12 years I couldn't get an agent who would send it out to a publisher," he said. The commercial book industry was cool to the dark subject of the title and the odd format of one novella stuffed between five connected short stories.
So Vann entered the book in literary contests and in 2007 he won a biggie, the Grace Paley Prize for Short Fiction. The prize included publication.
Vann noted the irony. "No editor or publisher ever looked at this thing and agreed to publish it," he said. "It only happened because it won that prize."
The University of Massachusetts Press printed a few hundred copies. Distribution was extremely limited. But one copy made it to the New York Times where, in 2008, it received a glowing full-page review. The Times included it as one of their "notable" books of the year.
Suddenly, lots of people wanted the book. But there were none to be had.
"It was pretty much impossible to buy," Vann said. "It didn't exist at the Barnes & Noble Website. University of Massachusetts did a reprint, but they still only sold maybe 1,500 copies."
Compare that against the 15,000 copies sold in the United Kingdom to date and the 63,000 copies sold so far this year in France, where it remains on the best seller list three months after its release.
"It's had 35 reviews in French magazines and newspapers, about that many in Britain and the Commonwealth. In the U.S. it's only been reviewed twice in print," Vann said.
The critical success of "Legend of a Suicide" is a welcome affirmation for the writer. But Vann seemed even more satisfied with how it has helped him come to terms with his father, to whom the book is dedicated.
"He wasn't a very good husband and he was very unhappy. But he was a great father. One nice thing about writing the book is that all the negative and debilitating parts of the bereavement have fallen away.
"What's left is the love."
Find Mike Dunham online at adn.com/contact/mdunham or call 257-4332.
By MIKE DUNHAM
mdunham@adn.com