This is MJ. I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer. Welcome to Fortress
Fiction episode 11. Join me as I talk about Hatchet. Hatchet by Gary Paulson
published in 1987, a very good year. After a plane crash, here's the synopsis,
after a plane crash, 13-year-old Brian spends 54 days in the Canadian wilderness
learning to survive with only a hatchet. That's it. That's the book and that's
exactly what it is. There's no secret there, there's nothing fantastical going
on, there's no science fiction plot, there's nothing, no murder mystery,
nothing. It's just him trying to survive in the wilderness, him trying and
succeeding to survive in the wilderness for all that time with this hatchet and
it's pretty fantastic. So here we go. Does this book belong in the Fortress
Fiction and Place of Honor? I would say yes, but. And the but I will explain as I
talk about the book in a very off-the-cuff manner, but definitely it's
something I would suggest that young readers read and even older readers. It's
a very good book, very well written. So here we go. The thing about Hatchet is
while it is a good book and it has very good things in it, it was entertaining, it
was well written, it was entertaining, and what else? It was well written, it was
entertaining, and it's about resiliency. I don't really know that there are strong
themes here. I definitely think this is something that would be good and
instructive and inspirational for somebody to think about life in a
different way because Brian is forced to think about life in a different way. He's
forced to see beyond his petty concerns. He even kind of reflects and thinks that
he's been reborn and it's true to an extent and well it's very true. And the
surviving the wilderness and going back to normal life affects him in a
way that seems to be true for the rest of his life. And because we get a little
thing at the end that I don't know what it's officially called, perhaps a coda,
although I don't know what that means and I don't like the way that word sounds.
And when I've heard people use it, it's a very pretentious and very pretentious
circumstances or it's a very pretentious way it's said. So I feel a little awkward
about using it and maybe I shouldn't be using it, but I am going off the cuff
here. So in the coda or in the ending thing that tells you kind of what happened
to him after he gets out of the situation, it's interesting because it
talks about how this seriously affected his life and it almost makes you think
that what we're living in right now is not the normal state of life and it's
not natural and there's something wrong and there's something deficient, there's
something that we lose by having all this safety and security and wealth. And
there is a topic of wealth that comes up which is food security basically. Brian
is in a place where he feels wealthy when he has an abundance of food and at
late in the book that's food that he finds that's you know like a packaged
manufactured processed food in a survival kit and before then it's food
that he's gotten for himself and that he's used his know-how and his skills to
go ahead and store food up for himself. And it's very interesting the book is I
don't know it's kind of provocative in a way but it's also very like simple and
very I don't know it's funny there's the reason that Brian is on a plane going
towards Canada is because he's in New Yorker and I believe he's in New Yorker
anyway he's flying up to Canada to visit his dad his parents are divorced
because his mother sorry this infidelity in the marriage the father doesn't know
about it Brian knows about it but it like I said his father doesn't know and
he never tells him which is something we learn in the book and he keeps thinking
back on his mother with love and tenderness but also with frustration and
anger a lot of frustration anger towards the man as well the other man
who is involved and Brian sees them a public place obviously not acting like
their best friends acting like they're something else instead and he knows he
knows that's the reason why his mother is divorcing his father now in reality
you know he could be abusive he could be whatever and we just don't know that but
from his perspective that's what we're seeing and it's interesting because this
thing about the divorce and the breakup of the family and the marriage is kind
of it's a through line it kind of is a through line and it's something that
gets used time and again to reflect and almost to show like a benchmark that
Brian is in a place where this is still something that's a concern to him and
eventually survival becomes such a serious concern to him it takes primacy
over his thinking about his family and why he's in the situation and he's no
longer mourning or bemoaning the fact that you know this happened to his
family or in his family but it's just a reality that he accepts and he moves on
it's just like the fact that water is wet and you know he has to hunt for fish
and things it's just it's just something that's true in the world and he's able
to accept that move on there's something interesting towards at the end of the
book when there's wrap-up thing is going on telling what happened with Brian in
his life after he was rescued which is that he thinks that his there's pretty
short period of time it seems as if his parents might get back together but that
never ends up happening and that's kind of interesting because in a way the book
is almost saying that life and the world is it's not uncaring or unforgiving but
life in the world will go their own way based on whatever internal logic the
operators who are causing things to happen have and you as an individual can
either choose to be crushed by that or you can choose to cope with that and
adapt and overcome and that's really interesting that's really interesting
it's true it is true there's a concept of you have your circle of control you
have your circle of influence you have your circle of concern and that the most
important thing for you to do as an individual from a survival perspective
is think about and manage your circle of control and try your best to do to
influence people around you in your circle of influence and I can't remember
what the other one was I said I don't know that well because I'm not like a
die-hard survivalist kind of guy who's setting up on all this stuff but it
makes sense that you really control you can control and you shouldn't worry
about the things you can't control and you should primarily take care of the
things that you have control over and if you have influence on others to take
care of things you should encourage them to do that as well but you can't force
them because you don't have control over them and Brian's doing everything he
can to survive with what he has in his hand which is the hatchet and it's
interesting because the hatchet is a gift from his mother and he wore it at
the insistence of his mother before they parted ways when she dropped him off
to get on this airplane and that hatchet that she asked him to wear that he was
kind of embarrassed to wear in front of the pilot of the plane is the thing it
is the thing that saves his life but really Brian is the thing that saves his
life he works with his resources and he works with his knowledge and he applies
himself in the situation and uses everything around him effectively to
survive and you know Brian's only here because of his parents and his mother you
know asked for the divorce filed for the divorce because whatever happened
happened and she was taking him to the airport and all these things she got
custody and he was going back and forth with his parents so it's almost like all
these things that happened in order for the scenario to unfold the way it did
but also everything happened in such a way that everything that he experienced
up until this point gave him what he needed the tools and the know-how to
survive in the situation but he had to have the will he had to do the work he
couldn't just expect that he would live and I know it's a really interesting it's
a it's like a thought-provoking book it could be useful to kids to read this I
think it's useful for older people to read it and to get into that mindset and
think about like how harsh and for even the world can be but also how beautiful
it can be and how your efforts in the world can make the world a more
beautiful place for you at least and there's like concepts of harmony with
nature and there's concepts in there about teaching yourself to be better to
be more resilient and to be able to survive in any situation and what
really matters in life what really has value in life and I really appreciate
that so let me see oh I have it saved here I at first thought that Gary Paulson
had only written this five book series because it's the Brian saga it's a
hatchet the river also called hatchet the return hatchet winter or Brian's
winter Brian's return which is called hatchet the call and Brian's hunt and
those books span 1987 to 2003 which is a decent amount of time but there are
other books and these are just some of them the mr. Tuckett saga which is mr.
Tuckett call me Francis Tuckett Tuckett's ride Tuckett's gold Tuckett's home
then there's the Murphy series Murphy Murphy's gold Murphy's herd Murphy's
war and then co-authored with another author Brian Burks you've got Murphy's
stand Murphy's ambush Murphy's trail then there's the Alita's series called
the cook camp Alita song the quilt and there's a lot more books check out the
full bibliography linked in the notes it's a source to a wiki but still
reliable and I think there's dozens and dozens of books there which is amazing
so you could find this book to read it and I suggested you because it's good
you can get it from your library for free cloud library has an audible or an
audiobook version of it that you can get for free if you have an audible
membership the base level membership you can get it it's included that's how I
listen to it you can buy it from publishers website which again is linked
in the show notes you could get it from Kobo as an ebook or an audiobook or you
can get it from audible as an audiobook as well as I'm sure Amazon you can get
an ebook there or Kindle I haven't checked to see I didn't check see if it's
in the Kindle store or not as a like a KDP type thing which means it's included
with your KDP plan or is it KDP well you know if you've got it if you've got
the all you can read Kindle deal then you know you know what it's called you
know to look in there for it as well which is probably something that should
include going going on from here but anyway yeah it's a good book there's a
lot of valuable things in it I don't it's not like a high level thing from
fortress fiction but maybe you're really because it's about fundamentals and
it's about the basics of life it's about like it's not a morality tale it's a
like a reality survival tale maybe even more so it's valuable and it's valuable
in much better ways much more applicable ways than like a heroic journey that
teaches about the self and morality and making a stand this is just about being
able to stand up on your own which might be even more fundamental and more
foundational and might even do a better job or serve better as something to
function as a foundation in the fortress fiction so definitely it's a recommend
it's a short book it's a good book and I think it has a lot of important things
to say anyway until next time I hope you take care yourselves and keep reading I
do not know what is coming next in fortress fiction you're gonna find out
with me at some point in the future so until next time folks take care I hope
you enjoyed that go to MJMunoz.com to leave any questions comments or other
feedback you might have there you can find all of my analysis art and fiction I
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