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In a recent radio interview, Jim Harrison laughed when asked about the demographics of his readers. For 40 years, he says, his publishers have been trying to figure that out. His characters typically inhabit less populated, unglamorous locales like the West and Midwest, and whatever wisdom they attain is often gleaned from the natural world. Donald, the central character of RETURNING TO EARTH, is in some ways the Harrison Ur-hero, facing his impending death from Lou Gehrig's disease. "I'm forty-five and it seems I'm to leave the earth early but these things happen to people."
The first of the novel's four parts is in his voice, dictated to his wife Cynthia, recounting what he knows of his family history in order to preserve it for his grown children, Herald and Clare. We find that he is the first male in four generations not to be named Clarence, and that he is probably over half-Chippewa. "For all practical purposes my dad and I weren't the least bit Indian but were just among the ordinary tens of thousands of mixed bloods in the Upper Peninsula."
Donald lost his mother to schizophrenia at a young age, but succeeded as an athlete due to his size. Working alongside his father, in the employ of a wealthy and decadent white family, he fell in love with Cynthia, the daughter, and they ran away and married as teens. Donald intersperses his family history with matter-of-fact comments on his disease and cryptic references to his personal religion, which is rooted in the more traditional Chippewa ways of his Aunt Flower, who lives in the woods and renders lard for her mince pie crusts from pigs she raises and slaughters herself. This digressive tale could be chaotic, but rather it pulls us into the story, gradually introducing the characters who will have to figure out how to carry on without Donald.
The remaining three parts of the novel feature the first person narratives of "K," Donald's friend and nephew; David, Cynthia's brother; and Cynthia herself, all of whom are vastly affected by losing Donald. K is the son of Polly, David's ex-wife, a smart young man who has been away at school but is not sorry to return to Marquette to help with Donald. He is not sorry for many reasons --- he loves and truly admires Donald, he loves and kind of lusts after Cynthia despite their age difference, and he loves and beds their daughter Clare when she finally arrives back on the scene from California. (In case you're paying close attention, K and Clare are not blood cousins, since K is Polly's son from a subsequent marriage.)
K's account covers Donald's death and burial in Canada, where the family can arrange these matters as they wish. David's part picks up after Donald is gone and as he grieves in his own dithering way. David and Cynthia's parents were both rich drunks, their father particularly perverse and at times abusive. As Cynthia says, David is "very nice but has been basically goofy since he was a little boy. He couldn't accept the fact that Dad was a lost cause." David is a womanizer like his father, but different in that he forms deep, lasting attachments to the women in his life and doesn't hanker after jail-bait.
Cynthia's part begins months after Donald's death. She has tried to make plans and continue teaching, but she is continually tired and interrupted by grief. Donald had told her she'd have to get a new boyfriend after he died, and she's aware of her burgeoning need for physical contact, but she's confused about how to go about getting it appropriately. There seems to have been no ambiguity whatsoever in the long, sure love between Donald and Cynthia. And while Cynthia is a realistic, strong person, we wonder along with her whether she'll ever truly heal.
Succinctly, RETURNING TO EARTH is a rich, carefully crafted novel about an admirable life and a good death. As K puts it, "To care for Donald in his present state is to finally understand that there are no miracles except that we exist. Like his ancestor Clarence, we ride a big horse to the east and then it's over."
--- Reviewed by Eileen Zimmerman Nicol
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