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The Badger Riot, by J.A. Ricketts, Flanker Press, 301 pages, $19.95

Historical novels can be dicey. Some authors take great liberties with the truth. When authenticity is thrown overboard in favour of thrills and sensationalism, historical novels often lose the ability to enlighten.

J.A. Ricketts's The Badger Riot is a rare combination for a historical novel: It is gripping and accurate. It is historical fiction done right. It recreates a world the author knew well when she was a girl – Badger, a small town in Newfoundland where three rivers converge – and breathes life and vitality into the community.

The Badger Riot is, on the surface, a novel about an important event in Newfoundland labour history: a three-month loggers strike in Badger, led by the International Woodworkers of America (IWA).

But it is much more than a run-of-the-mill strike drama. The Badger Riot is also a vivid portrait, beautifully rendered, of Newfoundland in the 1950s. Ricketts fashions a scrapbook, sharing with the reader snapshots of the countryside, the people, the architecture, the smells and the history. Ricketts even captures the Newfoundland accents in the dialogue.

The novel is told in three segments. Part I, Where Three Rivers Meet, firmly establishes a sense of people and a sense of place. Here, Ricketts shows her prowess as a storyteller, effectively weaving together dialogue and exposition to tell the stories of Badger's inhabitants.

Ricketts accomplishes in this novel what many authors who aspire to write historical fail to achieve: She brings history into the novel without letting it to interrupt the flow of the narrative.

Ricketts's Newfoundland is a world with one foot firmly planted in the 19th century and the other cautiously stepping into the 20th. “In 1954,” she writes, “the few roads there were in Newfoundland were unpaved, potholed and narrow, and when it rained there were many washouts. The best mode of transportation to the interior of the island was by train.” Like other great historical novelists (American author E.L. Doctorow comes to mind as a heavy hitter in the genre), Ricketts seamlessly mixes fictional characters (locals such as Tom Hillier and Jennie Sullivan, Cecil Nippard and Ralph Drum) and real-life figures (Newfoundland premier J.R. Smallwood and union organizer H. Landon Ladd.

The tension escalates in Part II, The Strike. By January, 1959, the third-person narrator observes, “things changed. Many strangers were seen on Badger's streets. Loggers from the outposts poured into town to support the union. The words ‘strike' and ‘IWA' were on everybody's tongue. Reality hit, and even young people were jarred out of their safe little lives.” The decision to send national and provincial police to Badger to end the strike triggered a violent riot on March 10, 1959. The event ended tragically when 24-year-old Constable William Moss of the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary was severely injured and later died of his wounds.

At the time, Ricketts was 14. She still has vivid memories of the violence and seeing the Moss's blood in the snow. The Badger Riot has been 50 years in the making.

In the third and final segment of The Badger Riot , simply titled The Riot, Ricketts ratchets up the tension by switching the narrative from third to first person. In a literary style reminiscent of Japanese director Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon , which tells the story of a crime through multiple perspectives, Ricketts's novel jumps from character to character. Each one narrates in her or his voice. The changing narrative style is remarkable precisely because it each voice is so convincing.

A word of friendly warning: Once you start reading the last third of The Badger Riot , you will not be able to stop. Set aside plenty of time. The prose carries you from chapter to chapter like a bobsled.

The narrative power during the clash between police and strikers is masterful. Telling the story through her character Jennie, Ricketts writes: “Time starts up again, and the sea of strikers and police parts to reveal someone down in the snow. There's blood ... oh my God! This one is hit seriously. I start to sob, great heaving sobs. Part of it is a delayed reaction to being nearly choked; part of it is from what I am witnessing.”

We see the same scene played over and over again from different perspectives. And somehow, without passing judgment on any of the participants, Ricketts conveys the pathos and impact of this incredible moment.

The Badger Riot is a masterfully written historical novel. It cuts across 50 years to bring today's readers back to a time in Newfoundland history when ordinary people resorted to desperate measures to improve their lives. Those who are left wanting more will be happy to know that Ricketts plans a follow-up novel that explores the lives of the characters after the tragic riot.

Andrew Hunt is chairman of the department of history at the University of Waterloo .