Voice in the Wild

After plans to live in Africa shatter, young journalist Laurie Sarkadi moves to the Subarctic city of Yellowknife seeking wilderness and adventure. She covers the changing socio-political worlds of Dene and Inuit in the late '80s—catching glimpses of their traditional, animal-dependent ways—before settling into her own off-grid existence in the boreal forest. There, she experiences motherhood and its remarkable synchronicities with the lives of caribou, dragonflys and other creatures.

As a mother, and as a journalist, Sarkadi speaks up for abused women and children, creating controversies that entangle her in long, legal battles. When she looks to animals and the natural world for solace, she encounters magic. Lessons from the natural world arrive weekly, if not daily: black bears roam her dreams, as well as her deck, teaching introspection; wolves inspire her to persevere.

This evocative memoir explores a more than two-decade long physical and spiritual journey into the wild spaces of northern Canada, around the globe and deep within.

Laurie Sarkadi

Laurie Sarkadi is an award-winning writer, producer and editor of EDGE YK magazine. She moved to Yellowknife as the Edmonton Journal’s northern bureau chief then spent sixteen years telling northerners’ stories through CBC radio and television. Her non-fiction has appeared in Canadian Geographic, The Globe and Mail, thewalrus.ca and the anthologies: Dropped Threads 3 and Kitchen Talk. She lives off-grid in the Northwest Territories with her husband and has three sons.