A long, engrossing book, well translated from the Russian -- a family epic out of Soviet Russia, which has none the less nothing of politics or economics in it. The story of one man's battle against nature, and of his struggle to hold to his determination to live where and how he pleases. He chooses the shores of the Arctic Ocean, with fishing and fur trading and experimental farming for a living and with the help of his wife, stays on proving the validity of his claim.