Customer Reviews

River of Hidden Dreams

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I seem to be working my way backwards through Connie May Fowler's list, after serendipitiously finding "Before Women Had Wings". Ms Fowler certainly has a gift with opening paragraphs - I usually give a novel 10 pages to hook me, but both of these books had me well and truely landed after one paragraph.

Sadie is a feisty, 40ish, tour guide in the Florida Everglades, but her real vocation is that of a story teller. She finds her captive audiences among those chartering her elderly but regal boat, the product of an almost unbearably steadfast love, inherited from her mother and grandmother after their amazingly unlucky deaths when she was nine.

Sadie is unconditionally loved by Carlos, an accidental and unwilling Cuban refugee, who has an endless tolerance for her headstrong and stubborn behaviour, and her complete unwillingness to commit to anything.

Sadie's struggle to come to terms with her own life is beautifully entwined with the stories of "her women", as their their stubborn strength and fortitude emerges though a series of dreams and childhood rememberances. We are drawn back to the times of newly emancipated slaves and Native Americans torn from their homelands (realising that was not so many generations ago), and are given a grand tour of the Everglades and the Florida coast. But mostly we are taken on a trip through love in many of its forms - unrequited, unconditional, uncompromising, enduring - as Sadie learns to love herself and allow herself to be cherished.

I recommend this book highly and I'm looking forward to reading more from this fine writer.

River of Hidden Dreams is Connie May Fowler's second book, and it is also the second book I have read of hers.

River of Hidden dreams is very picturesque in georgraphical description, rich in history (in particular, with the Native Americans), and full of emotion.

Sadie is afraid to get close to anyone, to let her guard down, and to love and be loved. She lost her beloved grandmother, Mima, and her mother when she was young. They died together, while they were dancing, when a hurricane hit and the roof caved in, killing them. Sadie was a young girl, and never got over the loss. All she had to keep her company were stories passed down from Mima and Mama, a regal boat the grandfather (Mr. Sammy) she never got to meet, built, and an old quilt her mother and grandmother had sewn.

This piognant story traces Mima, as well as Mr. Sammy's life, and then touches a bit on her mother's. It tells of how Mima was taken from her family and stripped of her Native American heritage when a wealty woman named Miss Alice adopted her and lavished her with the finer things in life.

Mr. Sammy, a warm-hearted mulatto, had befriended, and fallen in love with Susannah (Mima) for the second time (he had laid eyes on her briefly once before in passing, and her face haunted him until their second meeting) when she had fainted in a church. Soon, a whirlwind romance had gotten started, until circumstances had changed.

Sadie is haunted, not knowing if the stories she was told as a child by Mima and Mama were true or just fabrications. She had brothers and a father she had never met, and now she had a loving Cuban named Carlos, who wouldn't abandon her, no matter how high her walls were.

This is a story about Sadie finding herself, allowing herself to love Carlos and to be loved by him, and to revist her past to see if those lovely fables her grandmother uttered had any thread of truth to them.

Connie May Fowler tells the aching story from Sadie's point of view, and when Sadie thinks back to her past, those historic fables are told in Mima's and Mr. Sammy's voice -- illustrting the rich emotions running through three generations of women.

This is a wonderful story, and the only complaint I have is the ending. There was so many loose ties. There was a fleeting moment of Sadie thinking about the brothers she had never known. Did she try to find them? What else did she find out about her past? What kind of future was Carlos and Sadie jumping into?

Besides the loose ends during the conclusion of the story, the rest of the book was highly enjoyable. Connie May Fowler proves to be one of the most talented and gifted writers of our time.

This is the first novel I've read by Connie May Fowler and I enjoyed it thoroughly. She gives an excellent sense of place. If you like the earlier works of Barbara Kingsolver, you will like this book. Fowler brings to life the Gulf Coast area like Kingsolver does the American Southwest. I felt like I was sitting on a Gulf of Mexico shore.

The story also drew me in. The sweet but troubled romance mixed with narratives from a very racist era in our past make for thought provoking reading. Fowler offers us a close perspective on issues our culture still tries to ignore. Not to mention the book is just plain hard-to-put-down.

Thanks, Connie May Fowler, for writing such a good book.

"River of Hidden Dreams" traces the history of Florida before Walt drained the swamp and Crockett put on that white jacket. A woman in Key West begins an epic journey along Florida's East Coast and through time as she seeks her roots in St. Augustine. Anybody who's lived in or visited these places -- the real Florida -- will appreciate Fowler's ability to evoke places and feelings, particularly Key West and St. Augustine. The book's flaw is that the voice of the author, a relatively uneducated, middle-age tour guide in Key West, sometimes sounds more learned than she actually is. But not often enough to interrupt this solid journey into a world little understood outside the misnamed Sunshine State

Connie May Fowler hasn't disappointed me yet, and River of Hidden Dreams is no exception. Moving, literate and intelligent, it tells the story of a woman mired in the memories of her grandmother and mother, most all taking place in south Florida. I must admit that her Problem with Murmur Lee is still my favorite, but this will get a lot of re-readings just to catch her amazing ability to write enjoyable and moving stories.

Attention all Woman, If there is one book that you read, this would be it. It is so romantic that you want to become Sadie and Mima for just a little bit at certain points of the book and if you read this book you will know what I'm talking about.

It is the best novel I ever actually carve to finish and afraid of finishing it too soon. The author beautifully describe how human being strongly desire to connect their past, present and future together, and find meanings of their existence. I am deeply TOUCHED by the part when it giving details of the feeling of love. no self pitty, no narcissism nor nonsense, but in a analytical, objective tone to reveal the most secret emotion that we could all resonate. A book that I will fervently recommend to anyone.