At the Edge of All Things: In Search of Labrador

Melvin Baker is an archivist and historian at Memorial University of
Newfoundland, and the co-editor of Dictionary of Newfoundland and
Labrador Biography.

The author, who spent more than two years traveling the Labrador
Peninsula and observing the effects of industrialization on the Innu and
Inuit living in the area, has produced a fictionalized account of Martin
Rouleau, a Montagnais-Naskapi trapper, smuggler, and hunter, and his
half-Innu girlfriend, Catherine Boulanger. During a hunting trip in the
interior of the peninsula, the couple narrowly escape being burned alive
in a cabin fire set by two arsonists. Obsessed with revenge, Martin
tracks the arsonists to Davis Inlet, where he observes first-hand the
devastating effects of cheap liquor on the aboriginal peoples of the
peninsula. What he sees compels Martin to rethink both his plans for
vengeance and his lucrative smuggling career.