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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A Personal Journey, December 17, 2007
This review is from: The River Queen (Hardcover)
Mary Morris' father lived to the age of 102. He was many things during his long life; dandy, ladies man, business man, developer, husband and father. He also left strong memories in his daughter of his uncontrollable and unreasonable rages that he took out on whatever family member happened to be near. A portion of his life, but by no means all of it, was spent in small towns along the banks of the Mississippi River. Mary hires a houseboat, and sets off on a journey down the river to try and reconcile her grief, ambivalent feelings, and understand her father's roots better. Sounds like a fascinating journey. The trip down the river is an adventure in itself, encountering hurricanes, hazardous currents, and busy shipping channels that make navigating the houseboat a serious undertaking. Ms Morris writes well. The story flows, and the transit between musings on her memories and telling the story of her river journey is smooth and not jarring. It is a well written book. However, the story both of the river trip and her father seemed superficial to me. She tells mostly of everyday occurrences; who cooks dinner, where they eat on the boat, and the never-ending quest for a hot shower. The towns they visit are only given sketchy portrayal. She mostly doesn't care for the people they meet, and gives them a wide, therefore un-insightful berth. Her father's life lives within the same boundaries her memory supplied before the trip. She finds no insight, does not experience either elation, grief, or camaraderie of his memory by being on the river. A good travel book can be engrossing. A good book of exploration of familial ties can be enlightening. I was neither engrossed, nor enlightened, but I was also not bored to the point of giving up. I read the book waiting for the "other shoe to fall", and it never does. Nor will I take any memories from this book as I lead my life. I read it, it's done. Reading this book is like holding a handful of Mississippi river water; it trickles between your fingers, then it's gone.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
River Queen strikes a chord, April 8, 2007
This review is from: The River Queen (Hardcover)
I grew up in the same town Mary Morris's father lived near many decades earlier. Her discovery of the mystic nature of the River (as the Mississippi is simply called), her quest to discover the roots she distanced herself from as an adult, and her dead-on description of the small towns all along that River, struck a chord deep within me.
Mark Twain, of course, best gives voice to the mystical, magical nature of the Mississippi River, but Mary discovers in the 21st century that the very real spirit of the River still lives not only in her crew but also deep within her.
Mary also explores her feelings about her recently deceased father; by the end of her journey, she has discovered as much about herself as about the places her father lived as a young man.
And Mary's descriptions of the small River towns paint a perfect picture of communities turning their municipal backs on the River, the highway that made their very existence possible, and turning instead to the same suburban malls and suburban sprawl that one can find everywhere in America.
I commend this book to anyone who thinks about their family roots, to anyone who wonders if Twain's River exists anymore (it does), and to anyone who wonders where we came from as a nation of unique small towns to an America of numbing sameness.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
My River, Too, July 26, 2008
This review is from: The River Queen (Hardcover)
In her memoir, The River Queen, Mary Morris takes her readers on a unique journey down the mighty Mississippi as she makes a private journey of her own--coming to terms with her father's passing. Her naïveté is refreshing, and she admits early in the book, "I don't have the river in my head, yet." Unlike the writer's friend, who never thought about the river despite growing up in St. Louis, I grew up twenty miles southeast of St. Louis, and the river has been a large presence in my life. Like many Midwesterners, I have traveled the river and visited some of the places Morris describes. By the book's end, Morris has changed. She has learned things about her father's life and about herself, contentment evident as she pilots the last leg of her journey with the river firmly fixed in her head. I agree with T.S. Eliot, "The sea is around us, but the river is in us." Reading Morris's memoir will put a little of the river in every reader.
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