The Last Hunter: An American Family Album

Minnesota’s Will Weaver has been a hunter since he was a young boy, following in the footsteps of his father, a dedicated and seasoned outdoorsman. As he writes, “in the fall, when Canada geese came through and when partridge season opened, [we] heard the far-off thudding report of shotguns—and in November the heavier poom-poom! of deer rifles.” Hunting frames Weaver’s childhood memories, his relationship with his father, and his own definition of self. And although one side of his family lineage includes men who would not hunt, or go to war, or carry a rifle, Weaver is caught off guard when his son and daughter show no interest in upholding the tradition of the hunt.

The Last Hunter is a twenty-first-century collection of deeply personal tales—a truly American story. Weaver’s heartfelt rendering sweeps us along on a family journey from an isolated North Dakota farm “built around a fork and shovel” to postmodern America. Grounded in telling and luminous detail, The Last Hunter is an examination of family, life on the land, and those things we hold dear enough to want to carry along, one generation to another.

Praise for Will Weaver:

“. . . his stories view America’s heartland with a candid but charitable eye.”
—New York Times on A Gravestone Made of Wheat

“. . . pitch perfect. Superb.”
—Kirkus Reviews on Full Service

“ Weaver . . . is a writer of uncommon natural talent. He’s that rare Real Thing, a writer writing eloquently, often between the lines but always with an undertow of passion about what he knows, where he lives, what he’s been through.”
—Los Angeles Times

Will Weaver is a writer of many books, including Red Earth, White Earth; Sweet Land: New & Selected Stories; and Full Service, one of several of his award-winning young adult novels. An avid outdoorsman, Weaver lives with his wife in Bemidji.