Four Quarters of Light – An Alaskan Journey

Review by Philip Blazdell

"Ok," I thought, as I stood in the bookshop on King's Cross Station, "this book should keep me amused on my long train trip home."

'Brian Keenan's fascination with Alaska began as a small boy, while reading Jack London's wondrous, "Call of the Wild". With a head full of questions about its inspiring landscape and a heart informed by his love of desolate and barren places, Brian Keenan sets out for Alaska to discover its four geographical quarters, from snowmelt in May to snowfall in September...'

However, after struggling through this abysmal book, I decided that I would have been better talking to the pretty blonde girl who sat next to me on the lethargic British Rail train, who, despite appearing to be a total air head, might have at least given me someamusing conversation or amused me in some small way.

Keenan takes a great idea, bashes it around a little, and pads it out with what can only be politely described as a lot of metaphysical twaddle, ('I had to free my inner animal'), which reads like J.R Rawling on crack. Then he adds a bunch of badly drawn characters and painfully stereotypical descriptions, and expects us to sit back and enjoy the ride, which is terribly disappointing as I have enjoyed much of Keenan's earlier work.

Aside from the metaphysical twaddle of finding one's inner beast and removing dragon scales from one's soul, (I actually laughed out loud at this; surely the author can't really want us to believe this, can he?) Keenan actually undertakes a demanding and rigorous journey, and it's the lack of vision and clarity the author applies when writing about this aspect of the trip which frustrates the most. Greater characterization and more empathy towards the characters he meets may well have provided a better framework to hang some of the more esoteric aspects of this book on. It often seems that this journey, which the author would like us to believe is a journey of great spiritual enlightenment, could have taken place anywhere, as Alaska missing from much of the text.

I struggled to enjoy this book. I found the descriptions painfully labored, and the author came across as a conceited and egotistical mystic (why did he have to drag his poor family half way around the globe if he planned to wander off alone for weeks on end)? And the descriptions, which should have made my spirit soar, failed to impress. Overall, this was a deeply disappointing book.