Book review: Border Songs

A quirky current-events novel about the tensions across the US/Canada border between Washington and British Columbia, and how they pull the characters back and forth. Brandon Vanderkool is a rookie Border Patrol agent who seems borderline autistic, noticing small details that and pausing his workdays to construct structures out of stones, leaves, or branches. Everyone orbits around Brandon: His father Norm is a struggling dairy farmer, trying to keep his herd healthy and to support his wife Jeannette, who may have Alzheimers; Madeline Rousseau is his crush, who's fallen into the marijuana farming industry. Madeline's father Wayne squabbles with Norm and with the Border Patrol. When Brandon stops a car and discovers both marijuana and explosives, there's a security clampdown in fear of terrorism.

Ron Charles of the Washington Post called this his favorite novel of 2009; his review is online. I don't think it'll be one of my favorite novels for this year, but it's certainly skillfuly crafted, involving, and a wry inflection on current security tensions.