Common threads between sibling’s fate, black bears explored in moving memoir

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This article was published 24/01/2026 (228 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

People and animals are more alike than we might like to think — at least according to Trina Moyles.

In Black Bear: A Story of Siblinghood and Survival, Moyles uses accounts of her observations of bears in the Peace River area of Alberta as a backdrop for the story of her often-troubled relationship with her brother, combining the two narratives in a book that many readers will enjoy.

Moyles is an environmental journalist, creative producer and writer with a focus on land, wildlife, food security and climate change. She is the author of Women Who Dig: Farming, Feminism, and the Fight to Feed the World and Lookout: Love, Solitude, and Searching for Wildfire in the Boreal Forest. her writing has also appeared in Canadian Geographic, the Narwhal and the Globe and Mail. She currently lives in Whitehorse.

Trina Moyles and her brother Brendan grew up in northern Alberta with their parents, experiencing both the joys of learning about the animals and plants from their naturalist father and the struggles of growing up in a region where drugs and alcohol are common. Trina was already experimenting with these substances by the time she was 14, while Brendan also began to struggle with addictions at an early age.

Although they grew up in the same household, the siblings soon made radically different career choices. Trina found work as a fire ranger, spending hours every day high up in a tower and looking for signs of fire in the area to help alert authorities to the danger. She became familiar with the black bears in the area, watching them raise their cubs, form alliances and contend with rivals.

Interspersed with her observations of the bears, Moyles relates the story of her brother. Unlike his sister, Brendan worked for the oil and gas industry, a decision that caused many squabbles between the siblings. One of the issues was the lifestyle of oil workers, who often depend on drugs and alcohol to get them through long weeks working away from their family and friends. Despite a brief reprieve when he became a father, Brendan continued to struggle with addictions and eventually died by suicide.

Even in her grief over her brother’s death, Moyles sees parallels in how animals and people deal with loss. Like humans, bears appear to grieve the deaths of family members. Meanwhile, Moyles reflects on issues such as how people’s use of language can diminish the natural world, the “hyper-masculinity” of the oil and gas industry and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on people’s mental health.

Black Bear is generally an easy read, told in a casual style with few scientific terms or difficult sections. Readers might find the connections between the lives of bears and the author’s family a bit of a stretch at times, but these sections help explain some of Moyles’ responses to her brother’s actions.

Moyles writes very little about her parents’ involvement in family matters; while this might initally puzzle some readers, it allows the author to focus on her relationship with her brother and on the bears that she comes to know. It’s an engaging story with insights into both human and animal behaviour.

Susan Huebert is a Winnipeg writer and pet sitter.