Customer Reviews

To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

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.

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.

"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.

"To the Ends of the Earth; The Last Journey of Lewis and Clark," is a wonderful work of historical fiction. I'll admit that in the beginning, the first twenty pages or so, did not grab my attention at all. I found myself wondering how on earth I was going to get through this entire novel. Suddenly it was an hour later, I was over a hundred pages into the story, and completely intoxicated by it. The story is absolutely incredible, and once I got into it, I couldn't make myself put it down.

We all know who Lewis & Clark were (if you don't, go find out on your own, I'm not going to explain it to you here.) but what we don't all readily know, is what happened to them after their three year expedition. That is what this book is about. It opens in 1809, and Lewis is a man in trouble. He's drinking too much, writing government vouchers for things that later will not be honored, postponing the writing of his novel, and lying to his best friend.

Due to a corrupt adversary within the US government, Lewis sets out for Federal City (the then name for Washington DC) In tow, are all his journals, maps and notes from his previous expedition. En route, Lewis is faced with enemies and allies alike, sometimes making it impossible for him to tell the difference. Hearing that his friend may be in trouble, Clark packs up and leaves after him, hoping to save his friend.

Its hard to explain what takes place on the journey to Federal City without ruining the story for those who would like to read it. Just know that its full of twists and turns, ups and downs, chaos and honor. It's a story you won't soon forget, and one that should be added to any historical fiction library.

To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark is a very interesting read....not only a good historical fiction book, but also a compelling mystery. It was such an intriguing read that it was difficult to put down.

I especially enjoyed the characterizations. The development of the people portrayed in this book added a great deal of realism to this novel.

One can tell that the author researched extensively her subject matter. The book was quite authentic in time and place and sent the reader back to this fascinating period to learn more about this famous pair of explorers and the mysteries associated with their lives after their famous expedition.

Three years after the famous Expedition of Lewis and Clark, Meriwether Lewis lost his life under mysterious circumstances in the middle of the Tennessee wilderness. Suicide, murder, or accident - the mystery will probably never be solved. However, in To the Ends of the Earth, author Frances Hunter has woven the known facts of his last days into a cohesive and powerful novel of what might-have-been.

This is a novel of powerful characters - men who are legends in American history - and yet Hunter has drawn them as precisely and honestly as if they were men well known to us. We first meet Meriwether Lewis as a broken and tormented has-been with a ruined reputation, but soon the author reveals glimpses of the man he once was - not just through flashbacks of his famous expedition, but also through striking moments of lucidity in an ailing man tormented by his own inadequacies. Stalwart William Clark is almost larger than life, but unmistakably human in his faults - particularly in the way he overlooks his friend's shortcomings and in the way he treats his slaves. York is present, too, and although many modern history texts tend to sanitize reality by describing York as a valued member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, Frances Hunter reminds us that even after that valiant accomplishment, he was still Clark's slave. Although many other historical characters round out this novel, including the villainous General James Wilkinson, the three central figures of Lewis, Clark, and York loom large in the overall narrative.

I found To the Ends of the Earth to be a powerful, stunning historical novel, full of larger-than-life characters pried from the pages of history and set in a new and wild America far removed from our modern world.

Dianne Salerni

Reviewing for POD Book Reviews and More

In September 1806, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, arrived in St. Louis after a grueling expedition that had lasted for more than two years. Hailed as heroes, they were feted and honored by an eager nation forever pressing on its Western borders. This novel begins in St. Louis three years after the celebrations had ended with Will Clark serving as Superintendent of Indian Affairs and Meriwether Lewis as the appointed Governor of the Louisiana Territory. But the intervening years have not been kind to Lewis. He is fending off people to whom he is indebted and, more importantly, rebutting criticism from his superiors in Washington that he has misused government funds, and the rumors are washed down with a liberal amount of whiskey and a healthy dose of laudanum.

Sensing his vulnerability, Lewis is approached by James Wilkinson, who had been caught up in the Aaron Burr conspiracy a few years earlier, and who is now an agent of Spain. He attempts to involve Lewis in another conspiracy which will put him at the head of an empire carved out of the Louisiana Territory. Not only does Lewis not bite, but he heads off to Washington to defend his honor and to warn the government of Wilkinson's actions. Because Lewis believes that Wilkinson has hired men to kill him in New Orleans, he heads to the Federal City by way of the primitive Natchez Trace on horseback with the priceless records from the Expedition.

No one can say exactly what happened on the Natchez Trace, but what is known is that Meriwether Lewis, the hero of the Corps of Discovery, died alone in a room rented from a Mrs. Grinder. Most historians believe that Lewis committed suicide. Because so few details are known, the author is free to create a story of conspiracy, pursuit, brutality, betrayal, and murder.

The characters of Lewis, Clark, Wilkinson, and York, Clark's slave, are richly detailed and wholly believable. You can sense what it was like to travel the Natchez Trace with its seedy inns, runaway slave communities, and robbers. Everything necessary to recreate the early part of the 19th Century in the Louisiana Territory is covered, and all is woven into the compelling story of Meriwether Lewis, a man who had become a drunk, drug-addicted, persecuted wreck of a man, and his friend, William Clark, who could do nothing to save him. The Lewis and Clark Expedition is one of the great events of American history. But for Meriwether Lewis, it all ended in a rustic cabin on a territorial road in Tennessee, and To the Ends of the Earth is his story.

I hardly put this book down after I started it. It immediately engaged me. I was concerned about the characters whether good or bad (there are plenty of those), male or female, "important" or more secondary to the plot. Hunter's use of a wolf as a way to deal with mental illness was especially effective. History was followed faithfully when it provided needed details; other details were, I guess, made up, but done very effectively and within the scope of the known facts. I have recommended the book without hesitation to friends and family and will continue to do so.

A must-read for any fan of American History or just a plain-old great story. Lewis and Clark are alive with wit, patriotism and loyal friendship. The supporting cast will have you cheering the good guys and reviling the bad. Frances Hunter weaves fact and fancy so well in this story that you can't tell the difference between. Well done. I can hardly wait for the next one.

Frances Hunter is a pen name for two sisters, Liz and Mary Clare, who wrote "To The Ends of The Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis & Clark" together. It deals with the course of the relationship between Lewis and Clark and the mysterious death of Lewis in 1809, shot in a lonely inn on the Natchez Trace. Timed for release on September 23, 2006, "To The Ends of The Earth" will mark the end of the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial. "To the Ends of The Earth" is both a historical novel and a gripping mystery. It begins where the great expedition of 1803-1806 ends, with Lewis and Clark receiving kudos, fame, and political appointments. Lewis is appointed governor of Louisiana Territory, a virtual kingdom in size, and Clark becomes the Indian superintendent and militia general for the Louisiana Territory. Life in St. Louis, the center from which they operate, is colorful and unregulated in the extreme. While Clark, the more stable of the two, manages to marry well and begin to court financial success, Lewis finds the reality of post Expedition fame less than palatable, and he sinks into a frightening disintegration of mental illness and alcoholism. The story turns on the relationship between Clark and Lewis, and also the relationship between Clark and York, his companion and slave since childhood. "To the Ends of the Earth" is full of gritty historical detail and raw imagery that rings true across the years. "To The Ends of The Earth" is historical fiction at its best, pulling the reader in and re-engaging the mind and imagination in the drama that occurred 200 years ago.