With winter looming, a small northern Anishinaabe community goes dark. Cut off, people become passive and confused. Panic builds as the food supply dwindles. While the band council and a pocket of community members struggle to maintain order, an unexpected visitor arrives, escaping the crumbling society to the south. Soon after, others follow.

The community leadearship loses its grip on power as the visitors manipulate the tired and hungry to take control of the reserve. Tensions rise and, as the months pass, so does the death toll due to sickness and despair. Frustrated by the building chaos, a group of young friends and their families turn to the land and Anishinaabe tradition in hopes of helping their community thrive again. Guided through the chaos by an unlikely leader named Evan Whitesky, they endeavor to restore order while grappling with a grave decision.

Blending action and allegory, Moon of the Crusted Snow upends our expectations. Out of catastrophe comes resilience. And as one society collapses, another is reborn.

A DARING POST-APOCALYPTIC NOVEL FROM A POWERFUL RISING LITERARY VOICE

“The novel’s most significant achievement may be its mood. From mundane beginnings, the book increases its tension continuously across its 200 pages. It’s a cliché, but this book is hard to put down. Written with such guilelessness that it’s easy to read, and with such strong linearity and so little waste that it’s extremely absorbing, Moon of the Crusted Snow is a humble but welcome addition to apocalyptic literature.”— LOCUS

“This slow-burning thriller is also a powerful story of survival and will leave readers breathless.”— PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

“Moon of the Crusted Snow asks how do we live in a good way during the collapse of the infrastructure that supports modern life? For Evan Whitesky, the answer lies in rekindling Ojibwe, the old ways, language and culture. For other characters, when the food runs out, all options are on the table, no matter how gruesome. As the tensions between those surviving the end of modern civilization build to a harrowing conclusion, Rice deftly weaves tender family moments with his brutal survival scenes in the unforgiving northern Ontario winter. Chilling in the best way possible.”— EDEN ROBINSON, award-winning author of Monkey Beach and Son of a Trickster

Six years after publication, Moon of the Crusted Snow is #1 on the CBC October 26 bestseller list for fiction

PRAISE FOR MOON OF THE CRUSTED SNOW

“The rising literary star has created an unsettling story about a snowbound northern Anishinaabe community, where a postapocalyptic reality—no power, dwindling food, chaos—slowly creeps its way through the band. A young man, Evan Whitesky, seeks to restore hope and order to his community by turning to the land—to Anishinaabe tradition. A stellar Indigenous thriller.”— THE GLOBE AND MAIL

“With winter approaching, it’s the perfect book to read and reflect on our own lifestyles and points of view.”— WINNIPEG FREE PRESS

“We've been waiting for this story. It irresistibly turns our gaze toward something we already knew, but couldn't quite make ourselves see. The result is intense, thrilling and vivid as the darkest dreams-much like the old Anishinaabeg stories told by the Elders. As one revelation follows another, we come face to face with the mystery and responsibility of being human.”— WARREN CARIOU, Director, University of Manitoba Centre for Creative Writing and Oral Culture

“The creeping tension and vividly drawn landscapes make Waubgeshig Rice’s characters’ choices all the more real.”— TORONTO STAR

“A warning shot fired for all who read this: what would you do if everything suddenly turned off? How long would you and your family and your community last? Terrifying, riveting, outstanding. This. Could. Happen. Waubgeshig Rice, you just scared the hell out of me with this book. Bravo, Sir! I am in awe of you and I am haunted by the tension you've unleashed here. Stock up: winter and strangers who are starving are on their way. Unforgettable. I loved it.”— RICHARD VAN CAMP, author of The Lesser Blessed and Godless but Loyal to Heaven

“Akin to Cherie Dimaline's The Marrow Thieves or Cormac McCarthy's The Road, this book speculates a catastrophic, changing world while telling a riveting story that is as potent as anything in modern fiction. Rice gives us fully lived in, authentic characters that demand our attention and empathy. Because of that, there is hope in this long and bleak winter, and a surging power at the heart of this book that cannot be smothered.”— KEVIN HARDCASTLE, author of In the Cage and Debris

“Waubgeshig Rice is the CBC host of Up North. He is also a damn fine writer whose Moon of the Crusted Snow set my nerves on end. Which few books do… His novel is the latest (and greatest) apocalyptic work I have read.”— OWEN SOUND SUN TIMES

“In addition to being a new spin on the tech-pocalypse, it’s also an eerie, slightly fabulist novel… If you want a thoughtful, uncanny, snow-bound read that will have you battening your hatches for winter and rethinking what apocalypse means, pick this one up ASAP.”— BOOK RIOT'S SWORDS & SPACESHIPS

“Rice seamlessly injects Anishinaabe language into the dialogue and creates a beautiful rendering of the natural world… This title will appeal to fans of literary science fiction akin to Cormac McCarthy as well as to readers looking for a fresh voice in indigenous fiction.”— BOOKLIST