11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Evocative detail; authentic characters, September 21, 2006
This review is from: To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark (Paperback)
This is a well-written historical novel that manifests a great deal of painstaking research. I am not an expert on the period, so I cannot comment on the historical details, but as an avid reader I was constantly impressed by the ability of the writer to turn a descriptive phrase that makes you feel like you are there.
The characters are complex, rounded, and real. No one is one-dimensional. The moral ambiguities in the main characters add to the authenticity of the story. This is reality. No one is completely good or completely evil. The interaction between Clark and his slave York was especially intriguing to me.
It is amazing how fragile and vulnerable our republic was during this period. This is a great story, and it gave me a new-found respect for these two American heroes.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark, September 3, 2007
This review is from: To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark (Paperback)
As the book opens, its 1809, three years after the Corps of Discovery has returned from the West, Meriwether Lewis is governor of the Louisiana Territory and William Clark is General of the militia. While Clark is happily married, Lewis is plagued by malarial fever, is drinking too much and is dependent upon laudanum for the pains from the fever. They are both about to be swept into a treasonous plot to gain control of the Louisiana Territory. To say anything more would give away the whole plot.
A fascinating life-like portrayal of the last days of one America's great adventurers, and the author has provided an interesting theory on one of our country's great mysteries. Worth checking out for any one interested in this period of our history. Four stars.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Facts + fiction = wisdom and insights, September 29, 2006
This review is from: To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark (Paperback)
"To the Ends of the Earth" is a very good read. The characters are among the most authentic and convincing I've encountered in contemporary writing. Due to the suspense I couldn't wait to finish the story, but I find that now I miss the characters like old friends I don't get to talk to anymore. I always admire the way novelists can imagine so many details of speech, motivation, reactions and growth, but I seldom find so much insight into human experience as here. What's it like to be someone's lifelong buddy and partner -- and his slave at the same time? What's it like to be world-famous but so alone there's no one nearby you can trust? What's it like to feel you absolutely must take action, with life-or-death hinging on it, yet knowing you are utterly ignorant of what may be required? The author of the "To the Ends of the Earth" skilfully weaves these touching, even desperate, dramas into the fabric of the novel's dialogue and narrative. While getting a clear sense of everyday frontier life in the early 1800s, you come to an intimate recognition that life "inside the self" hasn't really changed.
In addition to its faithfulness to history, the plot is coherent and smooth yet cleverly structured around the characters' individual crises. By focusing each chapter on an individual, at a certain point in time, the author is free to develop the human side of the story using imagination. She does this so well that, while the plot is connecting the dots of the historical events, the fiction communicates genuine wisdom about people.
About halfway through, the story slows down a little as the protagonists get bogged down in indecision and what seem to be mundane affairs. This isn't a defect in creativity or craftsmanship, it's what happened: the circumstances of the main protagonists just dragged on, without improving, and they feel the strain of facing the same facts every day -- rather like the reader does. I wasn't sure what the real drama was. I wasn't sure what the suspense was, exactly, and what the stakes were, precisely. It wasn't as clear as a purely fictional who-done-it or romance. A lot like real life, the ultimate issues remained dimly seen and blurred. But when the decisive move is made, the drama turns intense and palpable, and it swept me along irresistibly.
Like I said, "To the Ends of the Earth" is a very good read.
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