Although I found the content interesting, I struggled through parts of this book. Starting with his family’s immigration to Canada in 1832, it read like a who’s who of Canadian art. It provided a timeline and thoughts of the many individuals that he connected with, which made it a bit disjointed to follow. 

Perhaps, it would have been more compelling if I had a greater knowledge of the artists but it felt like a lot of name dropping and facts, with less of the story of Tom Thomson. Perhaps it was not the book but my expectations (from the title) and that I was hoping to address the “mystery” of his death while the book abruptly ended and did not deal with the “mystery” of his death. Likely it is that this was not so much the story of his life but a list of events within his life.

The book does leave me looking for more. His beautiful paintings live on and the mystery surrounding his tragic death lives on.