Before you read this review, look up "steam donkey" on Wikipedia. Take a good look at the picture, then return. Now you know what a major piece of equipment looks like in Karl Marlantes' sprawling tale of immigrants, logging in the Pacific Northwest and what it all has to do with early 20th-century socialism. A doorstopper at over 700 pages, Deep River seems a work born from Willa Cather by way of Upton Sinclair. But this new book is its own animal, and it's something of a masterpiece.

The story begins at the turn of the last century in Finland, the home of the brilliant, fearless, passionate Aino Koski and her family. At that time, Finland was under Russian rule, and Aino is drawn to socialism and revolution, which she clings to even through bouts of torture whose ghastliness is only hinted at. Her commitment to Comrade Lenin only grows when she and her brothers emigrate—flee is actually a better word—to Washington. Nothing dims her zeal for the coming socialist utopia, not even her troubled marriage or motherhood. Aino brings her baby along to Wobbly (Industrial Workers of the World) meetings or leaves her with her brother and his wife.

Marlantes, author of the powerful war novel Matterhorn, immerses the reader in the life of the Koski siblings, whose worldview is dominated by sisu, a Finnish concept of honor, dignity and inner strength. Sisu requires men and women to be stoic, to always fight for their honor and to work from sunup to sundown. Page after page is dedicated to the dangerous and grueling job of harvesting gigantic trees from old-growth forests—see "steam donkey." The reader will be in awe of such hard labor done in the service of exploitive bosses who pay little. At the same time, Deep River bemoans the ruin of virgin forests, the pollution of pristine rivers, the fact that 100-pound wild salmon are now scarce. The book extols the love of family and friends and the beauty of the landscape even as that landscape is ravaged.

Best of all, Marlantes' new novel has more than a few moments of fun and laughter. Even combative Aino can laugh at herself. In Deep River, she takes her place beside Ántonia Shimerda as one of the great heroines of literature.

Following the eye-catching debut novel Matterhorn and the nonfiction What It Is Like To Go to War, both New York Times best sellers, Marlantes shifts his attention from the Vietnam War to the early 1900s, when the three Koski siblings flee Finland to escape the heavy hand of imperial Russia. Brothers Ilmari and Matti get work as loggers along Washington's grand Columbia River, while their sister, Aino, helps organize the industry's first union. For this family, creating new lives while upholding tradition is a balancing act akin to rolling a huge log down the river. A welcome publication, with Matterhorn published nearly a decade ago.

Marlantes's debut, Matterhorn: A Novel of the Vietnam War, a story heavily influenced by the author's experience as a marine, received critical praise for its unblinking portrayal of innocence, patriotism, and violence. Here, Marlantes pushes deep into his family's past to create a generational tale about Finnish immigrants, American capitalism, and forgotten heroes. Inspired by the 19th-century epic poem The Kalevala and Marlantes's own family history, the narrative is set in 1900s America. Fleeing from Finland to Washington State, the Koski siblings find work in the nascent logging industry of the Pacific Northwest. Youngest daughter Aino watches her brothers and colleagues lose their limbs, health, and wages as the need for timber outpaces a concern for human capital. Swept up in the energy of the emerging labor union movement, Aino matures into a fiery advocate for organized labor and the dignity of the human spirit. However, an egalitarian ideology pits her against America's cresting wave of industrialization and its consolidation of power and wealth. Though the characters feel real, this angle can make them seem like mouthpieces for political movements at times. VERDICT An admirable work, this monomyth is dense (maybe sometimes too dense) with Marlantes's gift for lyricism and evocative language. [See Prepub Alert, 1/14/19.]—Joshua Finnell, Colgate Univ., Hamilton, NY

Inspired by family history, Marlantes (Matterhorn) offers a sprawling, painstakingly realistic novel about Finnish immigrants in the Pacific Northwest during the first half of the 20th century. The saga begins in 1891 Russian-occupied Finland, when tenant farmers Maíjalíisa and Tapio Koski lose three of their six children to cholera. Six years later, their oldest surviving son, Ilmari, now 18, departs for America. By 1903, he owns a farm and blacksmith shop on Washington's Deep River and dreams of building a church. Brother Matti joins him, and soon Matti is working as a logger and dreaming of starting his own company. Seventeen-year-old sister Aino arrives last, fleeing Finland after being tortured for revolutionary activity. In America, she campaigns for the Industrial Workers of the World. During the 1920s, as IWW activity is suppressed, Aino is separated from her family and even spends time in a Chicago jail. Meanwhile, through the Depression, the Koski siblings put considerable energy into a variety of enterprises including Sampo Manufacturing (timber) and Scandinavia's Best (salmon). Their perseverance despite hard times and conflicts exemplifies Finnish "sisu," a combination of determination, courage, tenacity, and endurance. Vasutäti the Chinookan basket-weaver/healer, Aksel the fisherman/bootlegger, and Louhi the whorehouse/saloon financier, provide assistance. Marlantes's epic is packed with intriguing detail about Finnish culture, Northwest landscapes, and 20th-century American history, making for a vivid immigrant family chronicle. (July)