Customer Reviews

The River Stops Here: Saving Round Valley, A Pivotal Chapter in California's Water Wars

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A colorless subject, Water; an arcane topic, Irrigation. Not the usual recipe for a rousing read. But hold on to your bookmark! This is a fascinating tale, with feisty characters so vividly wrought that they jump from the page. The writing is as lyrical and eloquent as in any novel you'll find on the shelf. If you love reading about "the winning of the west," live in Northern or Central California, or drink from the tap in Southern California (thus exempting leotarded runners clutching designer water), you have a great story famously told, waiting in this soft covered gem. Mulholland move over!

What's especially good about this book is its account of how people succeed and fail at making their ideas count in the political arena--and of how they conceive those ideas in the first place. Whether it be material interest (the need to profit from land, water, or other resources), cultural values (wanting to protect a rancher's, a Native American's, or a naturalist's way of life), or aesthetic sensitivity (the beauty and balance of nature, which requires people to defend it), Ted Simon describes and animates the passions surrounding the debate over the Dos Rios Dam proposal of the late 60s, and in the process limns a parable that can inform us as we struggle with similar issues now. His portraits of the rancher Richard Wilson, the secretary of natural resources Norman "Ike" Livermore ("the man in the middle"), dam-proponent William Gianelli, and of course Ronald Reagan, the state's governor, are exceptionally well wrought. A book to read with care.