LitPicks Book Reviews—June 2012

Theme—River Journeys Authors often use rivers to represent the passage of life—and journeys on them to explore mysteries of the human soul. This month we follow river travelers who encounter the wild, both natural and human, and find themelves transformed.

Once Upon a River
Bonnie Jo Campbell, 1211
348 pp.

Book Review by Molly Lundquist
June, 2012
Margo Crane, the wonderful young heroine of Once Upon a River, is a throwback to the 19th century: she's Huck Finn in girls clothing (actually, boy's clothing, too) ... and Annie Oakley in jeans and a hoodie. She's resourceful—a crack shooter who kills, guts, skins, and cleans, her own food.

She's on the river...and on the run.

State of Wonder
Ann Patchett, 2011
368 pp.

Book Review by Molly Lundquist
June, 2012
Once again, as in Bel Canto, Ann Patchett plucks individuals out of their natural element, drops them into an alien environment, then turns up the heat—in this case, quite literally, the suffocating heat of the Amazon River basin.

In doing so, Patchett turns in another exquisitely nuanced novel, combining horror, beauty, and romance.

Heart of Darkness
Joseph Conrad, 1899
160 pp.

Book Review by Molly Lundquist
June, 2012
Gandhi was asked once what he thought of Western civilization. "It would be a good idea," he quipped. That exchange is very much at the heart of Heart of Darkness, a novel that in many ways was ahead of its time.

Conrad wrote his novel at the height of European colonialism, a system he witnessed in much of its gory brutality. Yet he was also writing for a British audience, which believed that bringing civilization to "untamed" lands was a sacred imperative.