“The truth is, Evan thought, these things do work better than they used to. High speed internet access had been in the community for barely a year. It was provided by the band, but connected to servers in the South via satellite. Still, the fact that TV, phone, and internet were all down at once made Evan uneasy.”

Though the modern infrastructure is relatively new and often unreliable, Evan is one of the first in the community to become uneasy due to the outages. His unease proves right as news from the south arrives in coming days.

“‘Then I understood what was going on. We had put the burn on to try to get some moose in. I can’t remember the last time we had to do that around here. But everyone in my dream must have been hungry. No one was saying nothing. I looked over at you—’ He paused and turned to look at Evan. ‘You looked at me. You looked scared. And that’s when I woke up.’”

Dan’s dream is the first in a series of symbolic/premonitory nightmares throughout the novel. His dream foreshadows the coming strife, particularly at the end of winter, when food supplies run low and the band can no longer rely on Western infrastructure and conveniences.

“Only two years separated the brothers, but somehow Evan had landed on his feet in adulthood while Cam hadn’t yet. When Evan had been out on the land learning real survival skills with his father and uncles as a teenager, Cam had chosen to stay behind, learning simulated ones in video games.”

Cam and Evan represent a social divide in the tribal community. Evan embodies the idea of incorporating Anishinaabe traditional ways into everyday life: The practicality of hunting and survival skills aid Evan and his family during the harsh winter months. Cam and other less-enterprising members of the community exhibit an overreliance on modern conveniences and the social welfare provided by the tribe and the Canadian government.

“Young people had been committing suicide at horrifying rates in the years leading up to the ban, most abetted by alcohol or drugs or gas or other solvents. And for decades, despairing men had gotten drunk and beaten their partners and children, feeding a cycle of abuse that continued when those kids grew up. It became so normal that everyone forgot about the root of this turmoil: their forced displacement from their homelands and the violent erasure of their culture, language, and ceremonies.”

In this passage, Rice draws attention to the generational trauma inflicted upon First Nations people though years of colonization and forced cultural erasure. This trauma and cycle of violence forms a thematic undercurrent in the novel, elicited whenever alcohol is consumed. The effective end of colonization due to the downfall of Western civilization at the end of the novel opens the opportunity for the Anishinaabe to heal from these tragedies.

“Survival had always been an integral part of their culture. It was their history. The skills they needed to preserve in this northern terrain, far from their original homeland farther south, were proud knowledge held close through the decades of imposed adversity. They were handed down to those in the next generation willing to learn. Each winter marked another milestone.”

Winter became an important facet of life and culture for Evan’s band after they were forced, generations ago, to relocate from their homelands near the Great Lakes. The harshness of the northern winters necessitates great care in preparation, from personal stockpiles of food to communal practices such as the emergency food cache, the diesel generator, and taking care of one another as a community.

“‘Boozhoo, mino shkwaa naagweg kina wiya,’ he began. ‘Good afternoon, everybody. Chi-miigwech for coming down here today.’”

Terry’s greeting to the assembled community is a good example of Rice’s use of the “metonymic gap,” a technique commonly used in postcolonial literature. By not directly translating Ojibwe into English, it creates a deliberate gap in understanding for Rice’s English-speaking audience. However, he provides enough context that the meaning can easily be inferred, even if it is not explicitly stated.

“But people like Aileen, her parents, and a few others had kept the old ways alive in secret. They whispered the stories and the language in each other’s ears, even when they were stolen from their families to endure forced and often violent assimilation at church-run residential schools far away from their homes. They had held out hope that one day their beautiful ways would be able to reemerge and flourish once again.”

Aileen is one of the few keepers of the Anishinaabe traditions left in the community. The crowd’s mixed reactions to her smudging ceremony are due to the generational gap caused by forced cultural erasure and reeducation in favor of English over Ojibwe and Christianity over Indigenous spiritual beliefs. However, Aileen’s efforts in preserving their culture are the spark of the new cultural renaissance in Evan’s generation.

“‘There’s something seriously fucked up going on out there. Why haven’t we heard from anyone? Why is the power still off? If we run out of that diesel, all the water lines are gonna freeze. Then it’s gonna be fuckin’ chaos here.’ Terry slammed his fist against the desk. ‘Fuck!’”

As the crisis intensifies without any word from the outside world, cracks begin to appear in Terry’s leadership. He proves to be a leader who is ineffectual under pressure, unable to make the tough decisions that are necessary for the community’s survival. His outburst in this passage is the first indication that he will be unable to lead his people once emergency measures fail.

“‘I turned back to face Maiingan and Nangohns, but I saw a young man and a young woman wearing old patched snowmobile suits. They both had long hair that flowed so beautifully. They smiled at me, and then I knew it was them. It was our kids. But they were adults. All grown up. They started talking to me in the old language, but I didn’t understand them.’”

Nicole’s disquieting dream, the second in a series of prescient dreams throughout the novel, involves her children helping her from sinking through the crusted snow. Though the dream disturbs Nicole, their adult appearance and ability to speak the “old language” suggests that Nicole and Evan will succeed in teaching their children the traditional ways. Nangohns and Maiingan represent the possibility of a positive future for the community.

“‘It’s chaos down there, Izzy,’ replied Nick. He was referring to Gibson, about three hundred kilometres to the southwest. ‘The food’s all gone. The power’s out. There’s no gas. There’s been no word from Toronto or anywhere else. People are looting and getting violent. We had to get the fuck out of there.’”

Nick and Kevin’s sudden return from college in Gibson confirms the foreboding suspicions Evan had been harboring about their situation. If the infrastructure is down in the cities as well, it bodes ill for the situation on the reservation, which relies on shipments of food and diesel, as well as on electricity from the hydroelectric plant.

“‘This was yesterday. And that’s when we really knew it was time to go,’ said Kevin. He talked about how they consoled the students distraught by the death, even though they weren’t very close with non-Native classmates. It could have been their shyness and how they mostly stuck together. It also could have been racism. But chaos brought them together, even just for a moment.”

Kevin and Nick’s relative isolation on their college campus reflects the feelings of isolation often felt by Indigenous people who leave their community. Unlike their mostly non-Native classmates, Kevin and Nick are equipped to deal with the deteriorating situation and find their way home.

“Scott’s smile did nothing to reassure Evan. He was on the run, that was clear. He needed a place to hide. What else does he know? wondered Evan. Why does he want to be here?”

Evan is immediately distrustful of Justin Scott: Beyond the fact that Scott is a rare, white visitor to the reservation, Evan cannot guess what ulterior motives Scott might have. Evan’s initial wariness foreshadows Scott’s dark actions and influence upon the community.

“Evan decided to show him the shop and then take him to the band’s main offices. For the first time, Evan considered the man’s own vulnerability. He’s stranded, thought Evan. He needs us more than we need him.”

Scott is brazen and boastful, and he claims to be able to hold his own in the wilderness, but the truth is that no single person can survive without shelter in the harsh, arctic winter. Evan realizes this in what will be a rare moment of compassion for Scott. The promise of shelter through the winter is more valuable to Scott than anything he can bring to the community.

“His heavy feet trudged slowly towards the pile of bodies on the left. Wrapped in fading material and stacked together, they all looked the same size. These were all adults, he concluded. Thank god there are no children here.”

Evan’s dream foreshadows the deaths that will become a common part of life as winter wears on. More than 20 people in the community will die, but, just as in Evan’s dream, no children die.

“‘What’s going on?’ he huffed as Isaiah tore down the road.

‘Fucked up news, man. Jenna and Tara Jones froze to death last night.’”

Evan saw Tara and Jenna alive the previous evening, partying with Scott at Cam and Sydney’s apartment. Scott’s involvement in their death is evident but hard to prove; ultimately, he is never fully implicated, beyond having provided the girls with contraband alcohol. Evan feels some responsibility because of his distrust of Scott and because he was one of the last people to see the girls alive.

“‘You didn’t have to shoot him. You had no right to shoot him. You’re an outsider here, too, remember.’

‘He was desperate and crazy. I was protecting us.’

‘What are we gonna do with the others now?’

Shit, Terry’s lost control, thought Evan. He just handed it over to Scott.”

Scott confirms Evan’s suspicions that he is quick to violence when he fatally shoots the leader of the southerners seeking refuge on the reservation. As autumn ends, this incident begins the fracture of the community, which will be split between Scott and the tribal council, still ostensibly headed by Terry, though he passively cedes the responsibility of leadership to others.

“‘Our world isn’t ending. It already ended. It ended when the Zhaagnaash came into our original home down south on that bay and took it from us. That was our world. When the Zhaagnaash cut down all the trees and fished all the fish and forced us out of there, that’s when our world ended. They made us come all the way up here. This is not our homeland! But we had to adapt and luckily we already knew how to hunt and live on the land. We learned to live here.’”

Aileen assures Evan that their people will make it through what the Zhaagnaash (white people) view as an apocalypse because the Anishinaabe’s world has already “ended” several times, and they have risen to the occasion. Aileen assuages Evan’s fears, even as he takes on the traumatic task of transporting the community’s dead to the makeshift morgue.

“Onaabenii Giizis usually referred to February but it could also apply to early March. He remembered hearing two teachers dispute about it when he was younger. One of them was convinced it meant the time at the peak of winter when the weather was so cold the snow simply froze over. The other said it was later in the season when the weather fluctuated between freezing and milder temperatures, causing the snow to melt and then freeze again, creating a crust.”

The title of the novel, Moon of the Crusted Snow, is derived from the traditional Anishinaabe month that Evan struggles to name. The “crusted” snow has previously figured in Evan’s and Nicole’s dreams, and it now indicates that, while spring is on the horizon, winter is at its deadliest time as the novel reaches its climax.

“‘A plan for stuff to eat whenever all that emergency food runs out.’

‘What could that be? We’re hunting and trapping already. We’ll set nets for fish when the ice breaks up.’

‘He says that won’t do it. He always nods at Brad and Alex when that comes up—like he’s trying to intimidate them. But they won’t say anything to me about it. And it’s weird—he seems to be getting bigger, though I know that’s not possible. Probably it’s just the rest of us are getting skinnier.’

Nicole felt a chill run through her arms. What’s he planning on eating? she wondered.”

Scott has taken control as leader of a portion of the community, including Brad and Meghan Connor, two of the newcomers whose leader Scott killed. Scott’s ominous assertion that he knows of a new food source and Nicole’s reaction foreshadows the allegations of cannibalism that Evan will later make against Scott. As in many cultures, cannibalism is a major taboo for the Ojibwe, accentuated by the very real threat of starvation in the harsh northern winters that could make it a temptation.

“This was Evan’s secret project: a shelter in the bush that he had begun the day after the food brawl. A backup, in case he and his family needed refuge from whatever turmoil might eventually consume his community.”

Evan’s tipi shelter is the culmination of his survival skills and preparation for the worst. It represents the hope of survival via the return to ancestral ways—something that will be necessary in a world without modern technology.

“Evan slowly raised the flashlight, illuminating the figure’s pale, heaving emaciated torso under sparse brown body hair. He brought the beam up to its face. It was disfigured yet oddly familiar. Scott. His cheeks and lips were pulled tight against his skull. He breathed heavily through his mouth, with long incisors jutting upward and downward from rows of brown teeth. His eyes were blacked out. If it weren’t for the large, bald scalp and the long, pointy [nose], this monster would have been largely unrecognizable.”

Evan’s final nightmare casts Scott as a wendigo, a supernatural figure in many Indigenous cultures’ folklore that represents the fear of starvation and cannibalism in the winter. This dream eventually causes Evan to connect the dots, when he and Tyler discover a body is missing from the morgue, of the hints about an alternative food source Scott has discovered.

“Evan had felt numb at first and he hadn’t cried over Aileen’s death until later at night. She had been his surrogate grandmother, his go-to elder whenever he had questions about the old ways, and he had loved her. He hoped she had enjoyed his visits, for they had always been special to him. He had known she would go eventually, but he had hoped that it would not be this soon.”

The impact of Aileen’s death reemphasizes her importance to Evan personally and to the community as a whole. Her death means not only the loss of her as a person, but also the loss of a direct connection with the old ways of living. Evan has the collected knowledge he has gleaned from her, but he and the rest of the community are now largely on their own.

“Evan shook off the sickening feeling in his gut and asked Scott outright, ‘Did you steal a body?’

Scott rolled his eyes. ‘Fuck sakes, man. Who cares?’

‘We care. Those are our relatives!’

‘It doesn’t matter if I did. This is a matter of survival, boys.’”

Though it is never directly confirmed, Scott’s attitude betrays the fact that he did indeed steal at least one body from the morgue to consume. Knowing of the Anishinaabe taboo against cannibalism, Scott sought to be the first to break the taboo, to take the brunt of the sin, and, in a perverse way, save the community. This links him with the wendigo in Evan’s dream.