Three Day Road

[kenneth505]

Looking thru GAC's post about a book thought to be, but not, banned for Canadian school children got me thinking about Three Day Road by Joseph Boyden and the issues it raised. Specifically the drug use and the blood lust of one of the characters. My question is what ultimately is this story about? Of course I know the starting points draw heavily on the real life exploits of Francis Pegahmagabow, but the fictional aspects of the book depart so drastically from that real story as to clearly indicate the book is not 'about him.'

At times I find myself thinking of the two friends as merely two halves of a schizophrenic personality, the drug using happy warrior and the 'human.' While this doesn't fit the story neatly there is a lot of mysticism injected into this book and so I feel a certain amount of license interpreting is allowed.

Thoughts?