From a remote corner of a vanishing American landscape, a bereaved father begins a journey down the river that has been all but inseparable from his life. At the river’s origin the shallow stream courses through the ranch where he was born. It is where he fell in love the first time and where the ashes of his son have been poured. “Now, before it’s too late, before I lose the will to do anything, I am leaving this land to follow the sticks I dropped into the river so long ago.” But this man’s passage along the interlacing rivers to the ocean will not be simple or disconnected from the life he leaves behind. His estranged son’s last angry words echo in his memory, and despite moments of pure concentration on the waters ahead, the solitary voyager finds the past seeping into his thoughts and dreams. In River, novelist Lowen Clausen has created a story of deep beauty and seriousness, in which he weaves together the complex threads of one man’s search for wholeness. Clausen’s rich, elegiac prose becomes its own landscape and river, transporting the reader on a journey through despair and doubt into discovery.
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Inspired by a 1,700-mile, 50-day kayak voyage novelist Clausen (Third and Forever) and his daughter took from Nebraska's Loup River to where the Mississippi empties into the Gulf of Mexico, this novel is narrated by a bereaved father following the same route. Haunted by his grown son's death, his failed marriage and his own unfulfilled childhood dreams, the middle-aged man, known only as John, leaves his ranch and sets off in a homemade kayak named "Gloria," pursuing an echo of Huckleberry Finn's search for freedom and identity. Though his self-pity can be overbearing, John gradually opens up to the reader through flashbacks, dreams and conversations, revealing a complex character unsure of his own motives and desires. Clausen's best moments turn up on dry land, where John runs into a cast of intriguing characters, but the majority of the action occurs between man and river; as such, the plot can get stuck in slow-moving waters. Still, Clausen's vivid prose and attention to detail should keep the readers' interest, especially those intrigued by river kayaking.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Lowen Clausen is the author of First Avenue, Second Watch, and Third & Forever. He lives in Seattle.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Travels with Lowen,
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This review is from: River (Paperback)
Lowen Clausen's fourth novel, River, flows like the Loup, Platte, Missouri, and Mississippi rivers on which its protagonist, John, kayaks. He's searching for himself and grieving the premature death of his son, Amleth. Although River is a novel, the author's description and historical storytelling is reminiscent of Ian Frazier's travel narrative, Great Plains--which covers some of the same territory. It also possesses the gathering psychological and emotional momentum of Robert M. Persig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Mr. Clausen's vivid place descriptions, historical story telling, character development, and the text's flowing pace make it an enjoyable read that is difficult to put down. This means it may cause some sleep deprivation, despite quotations inside the front cover suggesting otherwise.
Readers curious about and familiar with the region paddled through will likely enjoy it most. I remain curious if live ducks really do reside in that hotel in Memphis. Who knew that the name Loup River was derived from the French word for wolf? One could likely live on its banks in central Nebraska for a long time and never reach, or even ask the question that leads to, that insight. My only request is that when this book goes into a second printing, it would benefit from additional maps throughout to assist readers less familiar with every curve in the rivers traveled. In any case, Clausen's River will eventually join a place on my bookshelf of the American Center with Frazier's Great Plains, Lois Phillips Hudson's, The Bones of Plenty, Kathleen Norris's, Dakota, and Mark Twain's, Huck Finn. I say it will eventually deserve its place on that shelf because I'm waiting for it to return from a friend to whom I have already lent it.
1.0 out of 5 stars
The River,
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