Devlin Stead grows up a lonely orphan in late 19th century Newfoundland. When he begins receiving letters from the esteemed but mysterious explorer Dr. Frederick Cook, they entirely change his understanding of who he is and what he might become. Invited by Dr. Cook to become his apprentice, Dev eagerly heads for New York City, where he is introduced into society and joins his mentor in epic attempts to reach the North Pole before Cook's arch-rival Robert Edwin Peary. source
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“In 1881, Aunt Daphne said, not long after my first birthday, my father told the family that he had signed on with the Hopedale Mission, which was run by Moravians to improve the lives of Eskimos in Labrador. His plan, for the next six months, was to travel the coast of Labrador as an outport doctor.”
Novel's opening sentences anchor the family backstory in the Moravian Hopedale Mission on the Labrador coast before action moves to St. John's and then New York; CBC Books reproduces the verbatim Chapter One excerpt.
Wayne Johnston, The Navigator of New York (Knopf Canada, 2002), Chapter One, on CBC Books — source
