Cole Matthews is a teenage delinquent who has gotten in trouble in the past for fighting but the recent kid he beat up really badly named Peter Driscal. He's obstinate, and even though he is looking at serious jail time his understanding parole officer, a man named Garvey, gets him into this Native American justice program called Circle Justice. The main idea that his sentencing is based off of is that the natives look at it as a chance to heal instead of punish. They are sending him to a remote island in Alaska to live of the land for a year. Cole goes along with this just because of the opportunity to get out of going to jail, he is actually just planning and escaping from the island as soon as he gets dropped off at the island. Garvey and an elder named Edwin drop Cole off at the island. As …show more content…
Instead of respecting Spirit Bear, though, Cole tries to kill him…which leads to the bear mauling him and leaving him bleeding and in pain. Cole almost dies during this time period, but in the process, he thinks a lot about his life and how he's made some serious mistakes. Before he can die, Edwin and Garvey come back and find him and take him back to safety. Cole returns to Minneapolis (his hometown), where he recovers and is pretty sure that he's going to get sent to jail after squandering his time on the island. When he is back home recovering he spends more time with his mother, who ends up apologizing for not spending more time with him and not being there when he was a child. After hurting and abusing Cole for years he was just recently sent to jail for child abuse, and for that reason he was not able to visit Cole. After he fully recovered Garvey and Edwin put in word to send him back to their islands and not jail because they have seen change in him.So after he recovers physically, they take him to the island and drop him off