Douglas Glover tells of a Rabelaisian riff on a dramatic historical event: the story of Marguerite de la Rocque, niece of the vicious Sieur de Roberval. Having caught her in the arms of her lover, Roberval set the lustful pair and Marguerite's nurse ashore on the desolate Isle of Demons. Many months later, after her nurse, her lover, and her newborn baby had all died, Marguerite was rescued by a passing ship and taken home to France. Of course, the plot is only the beginning. Elle is a Grand Guignol, a Brueghel painting in words. What with real bears, spirit bears, and perhaps hallucinated bears, with mystified and mystifying Natives, with the lurid residue of religious faith, and with a world of self-preserving belligerence, the heroine of Elle not only survives but triumphs. At the end of the book, another twist brings Elle all too close to home.