Gone to the Woods: Surviving a Lost Childhood by Gary Paulsen (review)

Paulsen, Gary Gone to the Woods: Surviving a Lost Childhood. Farrar, 2021 [368p] Trade ed. ISBN 9780374314156 $17.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9780374314163 $9.99 Reviewed from digital galleys R Gr. 6-10

With his father in Asia during World War II, the five-year-old protagonist has become something of a mascot for his mother, a Chicago factory worker, as she trawls the clubs at night. His grandmother knows an intervention is required, so she arranges for the boy to travel, alone, to the home of his aunt Edy and her husband, Sig, who welcome him warmly and bring him up to speed on the many tasks involved in living off a farm at the edge of the northwoods. The boy thrives, accepting hard labor with little overt complaint, learning to balance keen observation with a few well-timed questions, establishing an enduring affinity to the woods, and basking in the love of his aunt and uncle. At the war's end, though, his mother yanks him off to the Philippines to rejoin his father; while the armistice has been signed, the fighting continues and the boy is smack in the middle of it—the street violence bred by political collapse and vengeance, and the domestic violence between his alcoholic parents, who barely know he's there. The family's return to the States solves nothing, and the boy raises himself, running away, scraping up odd jobs, avoiding school, where he doesn't fit in, and often retreating to the woods, where he finds emotional comfort and physical sustenance; then at last, a library, a TV repair program, and a stint of military service set him on the right track. One explicit name reference and couplet of closing lines ("What the hell. Might as well write something down") identify "the boy" as Paulsen, the author most of this memoir's readers already know and admire. Cadence shifts from poesy that lingers in nature encounters to racing sentence fragments of urban endurance, as this master of survival stories draws his audience deep into his experience, whiplashing from comfort and growth into abject neglect and on to a fulfilling adult life. This survival story, up close and personal, is one Paulsen fans will not want to miss.