Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead

“…it’s animals taking revenge on people…”

I loved this much more than Flights by Olga Tokarczuk, this is a much more cohesive story. There’s a good mystery that drives the plot, and a lot of focus on our relationship with the environment, animals, and earth. The main character (Janina) is a bit eccentric and very into astrology, but throughout the book you believe her, and you sympathize with her point of view.

Janina asks people in the story, and the reader questions such as “What sort of world is this where killing and pain are the norm?”, she’s talking about animals; but its beyond that, its the whole ecosystem, its humans, its more. She says, “Attitude towards animals…show the truth about a country” which implies that if a country can not even hold respect for an animal, maybe there are other things it will take for granted as time goes on.

There’s a lot of funny remarks, observations, etc..:

“Are you religious?”

“Yes…I’m an athiest”

“…someone who overuses the phrase ‘in truth’ is sure to be a liar”

“…it seems to me we’re living in a world that we fabricate for ourselves. We decide what’s good and what isn’t…and then we spend our whole lives struggling with what we have invented for ourselves…”

This book’s mystery and characters are terrific. Its an engrossing read where I really felt like I was in a snow covered remote part of Poland, isolated from society, trying to mind my own business like Janina. I’m glad Flights by Olga didn’t discourage me from reading this, highly recommended!

Some words I learned:

Foehn: A hot southern wind on the northern slopes of the alps.

Reconnoiter: Make a military observation of a region.

Saturnine: (of a person) Slow and gloomy; or dark in color, moody, mysterious.

Chiaroscuro: Treatment of light and shade in drawing and painting.

Tenebrism: Dark, gloomy, mysterious; dramatic illumination.

Taphonomy: Branch of paleontology that deals with fossilization.