The Resurrection of Joseph Bourne, or A Word or Two on Those Port Annie Miracles

The Resurrection of Joseph Bourne, or A Word or Two on Those Port Annie Miracles, (Toronto, 1979), Gov Gen's Award (1980), by Jack Hodgins, is a richly inventive, life-affirming tall tale which takes place in the fictional, rain-drenched mill town of Port Annie on the NW tip of Vancouver I, a little community which keeps sliding into the ocean. Hodgins's protagonist, Joseph Bourne, once a world-renowned poet and healer, has become a bitter, reclusive derelict who wishes to live anonymously, but he is resurrected by a beautiful sea nymph who is washed ashore by a tidal wave. She restores Bourne's healing powers so that he works his magic of unselfish love on the large cast of comic and eccentric characters. Hodgins's energetic style and fertile imagination adroitly combine the ordinary with the wondrous.