Take a photo of a barcode or cover
4.14 AVERAGE
4.14 AVERAGE
If you love the Northwest, you should read this book. Egan's first book is a thorough look at the landscape, the people, and the history of the region. Even though it has been twenty years since it was published, it is still incredibly relevant. Egan is an environmentalist and an outdoorsman and a lot of the book is about water and trees. He talks about how the landscape has shaped the people and how the people have shaped the landscape.
I learned a lot about my home and Egan has inspired me to explore it further.
I learned a lot about my home and Egan has inspired me to explore it further.
If you want to read a super informative, engaging, creative read on the Pacific Northwest, this book is your friend. Although a tad long and information dumpy at times, I learned a lot in this creative nonfiction book. Definitely worth the read!
When I worked at a picturesque little indie bookstore located along a PNW waterfront in the 1990s, we couldn't hardly keep this book in stock. I should have read it then, because I am sure I would have loved it too. Alas, I didn't, and it took me until now in 2019 to check it off my to-read list. I should not have waited, because what would have seemed timely and insightful then feels somewhat dated and incomplete now. So much more history has happened in almost 30 years, and the way we write about marginalized populations has shifted too. To be honest, the reason I finally read The Good Rain was to see if it would be a good choice to give my teens for their local history studies. Unfortunately, despite being very well written, it isn't going to serve that task well anymore. We would need to stop every other page and provide corrections and/or a long winded update to bring them up to speed to current affairs; there's more recent resources that will do that job more effectively. Too bad. If the author revised and updated, then we'd probably be all over it.
Timothy Egan follows in the footsteps of Winthrop, who traveled in the Pacific Northwest in the 1850s and wrote a travel book about it. Egan looks at how the Pacific Northwest has and has not changed since then. Each chapter explores a particular area, examining its history, geography, and some of the interesting people who live there. The book focuses a lot on nature and ecology, because nature is such a major defining characteristic of the area.
There's lots of interesting information in here. Egan is a good writer. Some chapters were less interesting than others, so I found myself skimming parts of the book.
The book was written in 1990, and naturally the Pacific Northwest has changed a lot in 30 years. If you're looking for a current description of the Pacific Northwest, this isn't it. The logging industry, salmon recovery efforts, and attitudes about damming rivers are very different now (although they all follow trajectories found in the book). The chapter about Seattle is downright hilarious now: Egan talks about efforts to curb growth in the city of Seattle in the 1980s. The Seattle of today is suffering a lot from those efforts, because you can't stop a city from growing, and today Seattle is one of the fastest-growing cities in the US and that growth is causing a lot of major problems.
As a Pacific Northwest transplant, now I understand what the fuss about salmon is all about. A good summary of the history of the PNW.
Even though Egan wrote this book over 20 years ago, it was not very dated and explored issues (clear cutting of ancient forests, depletion of salmon stocks, damming the rivers of the Northwest, among other topics) that are relevant today. The book was well-written and thoroughly researched, and I learned many things I didn't know about this place where I've lived for almost half of my life. Highly recommended.
At first I was excited by this book. Having just moved to Seattle I was looking forward to seeing all of the forests and mountains highlighted in the book. Then I got depressed by the spectre of overfishing, development, misguided infrastructure projects, and unsustainable logging,
Not a fan of the Army Corps of Engineers, is Mr Egan.
Rangerette? seriously?
Not a fan of the Army Corps of Engineers, is Mr Egan.
Rangerette? seriously?
"And in all that period while I was so near Nature, the great lessons of the wilderness deepened into my heart day by day, the hedges of conventionalism withered away from my horizon, and all the pedantries of scholastic thought perished out of my mind forever."
~The Canoe and the Saddle, Theodore Winthrop
~The Canoe and the Saddle, Theodore Winthrop
This is Timothy Egan's homage to the Northwest. I bought the book at an author's reading for his new book [b:The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America|6452538|The Big Burn Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America|Timothy Egan|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255575610s/6452538.jpg|6642737]. When Egan signed it for me, he said that I might find it dated. It was published in 1990 and is somewhat dated--the Seahawks are still playing in the Kingdome, Astoria has not yet attained cuteness (based on being mostly a tourist town) and although he talks about the wind in the Gorge in reference to the windsurfers, the windmill generators have not shown up.
He ties the narrative to a book written by Theodore Winthrop, the great, great, great grandson of John Winthrop, the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Theodore Winthrop took a three month journey around the Northwest in 1853 and wrote a book about it. Egan compares what Winthrop found with what has happened since--salmon, timber, rivers, Native Americans, farming. As an Oregonian, many of the tales are familiar, but he knits some of the recent history together for me. And there are stories that are new to me.
His writing is beautiful and evocative. For instance, he describes, perfectly, something that I have never been able to put into words--"Sometimes the wind along the Pacific shore blows so hard it steals your breath before you can inhale it."
He ties the narrative to a book written by Theodore Winthrop, the great, great, great grandson of John Winthrop, the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Theodore Winthrop took a three month journey around the Northwest in 1853 and wrote a book about it. Egan compares what Winthrop found with what has happened since--salmon, timber, rivers, Native Americans, farming. As an Oregonian, many of the tales are familiar, but he knits some of the recent history together for me. And there are stories that are new to me.
His writing is beautiful and evocative. For instance, he describes, perfectly, something that I have never been able to put into words--"Sometimes the wind along the Pacific shore blows so hard it steals your breath before you can inhale it."
Three stars doesn't do this book justice. It should get 5 for the second half, and -1 for the worst parts.
When it's good, this is a beautiful, moving and informative description of the Pacific Northwest. Egan can be wonderful at describing the beauty of the region and the emotions it induces in people, and at the stupidity and sheer unbridled greed that has led to some of the worst problems we have today. But he can also over-reach, both in terms of just over-egging his writing and exaggerating claims (he makes Rainier Valley sound like Compton) to the point of undermining his own credibility. And in places he falls for the sort of ridiculous stereotypes and cliches that make it sound like he's writing this all from New York.
The chapter about Victoria, in particular, was such an irritating pastiche of stereotypes about Canada, the US and Britain that it almost made me stop reading and I would advise anyone to skip it altogether. I'm glad I continued though, and most of the badness is concentrated towards the beginning.
The chapters on native tribes and on salmon are particularly beautifully written, and the parts that I know the factual background to check out with the other things I've read or learned about. They will make you angry, but appropriately so.
When it's good, this is a beautiful, moving and informative description of the Pacific Northwest. Egan can be wonderful at describing the beauty of the region and the emotions it induces in people, and at the stupidity and sheer unbridled greed that has led to some of the worst problems we have today. But he can also over-reach, both in terms of just over-egging his writing and exaggerating claims (he makes Rainier Valley sound like Compton) to the point of undermining his own credibility. And in places he falls for the sort of ridiculous stereotypes and cliches that make it sound like he's writing this all from New York.
The chapter about Victoria, in particular, was such an irritating pastiche of stereotypes about Canada, the US and Britain that it almost made me stop reading and I would advise anyone to skip it altogether. I'm glad I continued though, and most of the badness is concentrated towards the beginning.
The chapters on native tribes and on salmon are particularly beautifully written, and the parts that I know the factual background to check out with the other things I've read or learned about. They will make you angry, but appropriately so.