I wish I could remember the title... But the basic story was a kid was in a commuter plane over the Alaska or Canada bush. The plane crashed. Three survived, the pilot, the kid, and an old native who spoke no english. The pilot didnt live long, he went over a water fall in the aircraft riding it on top like a bull, certain of his fate, he wanted to go out like the bull rider he always wanted to be.
The kid was shown how to live off the land by the old native. They trapped beaver in frozen ponds by making a hole in the ice, and whacked the beavers on the head when they came for air. They brain tanned the skins for clothing and eventually a drum was also made. It was so cold you could hear trees exploding from freezing. The air was so cold, you couldn't rub snow in your hands cause if was needle like, but when the weather warmed, they did it some to restore blood flow ( or something of the sort ). The imagery of the northern lights and the scenery was superb in this book. I wish I could recall the name.
A other story I cant recall the title of was a kid and his mountain man dad. They were in colonial days. The dad couldn't function in society and raised his kid off the land. They were nomadic. The dad had all kinds of spots across thousands of miles memorized of good places to trap and camp. Sometimes in a downpour they would huddle in a hollowed out tree that the dad knew was there. They would bear hunt in the dead of winter, looking for the steam of the bears breath as it hibernate. On especially cold winter the dad left his boy with a girl they had come across, boy went hunting, as an excuse to leave the family, as he couldn't stand the social interaction, and the burden he placed on an already hungry family, but he killed a bear. His thoughts were that bear would feed him for the winter by himself, but realised he could pay his debt to the family who cared for him with the meat so he brought it to them, rather than stay on his own in the woods, tracking down his father.
