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A review by catherine_the_greatest
The River of Kings by Taylor Brown
4.0
A kingdom of cypress and tupelo, od water oak and river birch and black willow from which moccasins might hang like scaled question marks. Roads will cross the river only twice, and ancient swamps and sloughs and oxbows insulate its snaking path from the high ground of men, harboring beds and roosts of the rare and endangered.
The Little Amazon.
Their father was born on this river, in one of the shantyboats that float on the river like flood-borne houses. The place is downriver from here, a day's long paddle, and they plan to reach the house by dusk. They will overnight there, then push on for four more days, delivering their father's ashes to the river's mouth, a long last ride down the waters that birthed him.
The main narrative of The River of Kings follows brothers Hunter and Lawton Loggins as they kayak down Georgia's Altamaha River, following the somewhat mysterious death of their volatile, abusive father Hiram. The authorities have attributed his death to a sturgeon attack. (That's apparently a real thing with east coast species.) But the Altamaha is a wild river, with more than its share of illegal activities, and older brother Lawton, a Navy SEAL who bore the brunt of their father's temper and inherited some of it, suspects a more sinister explanation. Hunter, whose high school football injury pushed him down an academic path, is more interested in the history and mythology of the river.
Interspersed with the brothers' journey are glimpses of their father after he returned from Vietnam, the choices and misfortunes that made him even harder, and a dramatization (based on primary sources) of the first Europeans to travel up the Altamaha, an ill-fated French expedition in 1564. All three storylines fascinated me.
The Altamaha is a river of many kings: the original native kings who alternately allied with and fought against the European invaders, the redneck kings who run drugs and other illegal trade on the river, and a mysterious figure known as King Uncle, a childhood friend of Hiram's turned preacher turned wild man of the river. There's enough unknown in each plot to drive the story, and sufficiently lovely prose to make a very enjoyable read.
I'm shocked that fewer than 700 GR users have rated this one. Mr. Brown's most recent novel, [b:Gods of Howl Mountain|34964885|Gods of Howl Mountain|Taylor Brown|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1494814260s/34964885.jpg|56239882], has received more notice, but I think I liked this one more. Seriously, read this. It's good.
The Little Amazon.
Their father was born on this river, in one of the shantyboats that float on the river like flood-borne houses. The place is downriver from here, a day's long paddle, and they plan to reach the house by dusk. They will overnight there, then push on for four more days, delivering their father's ashes to the river's mouth, a long last ride down the waters that birthed him.
The main narrative of The River of Kings follows brothers Hunter and Lawton Loggins as they kayak down Georgia's Altamaha River, following the somewhat mysterious death of their volatile, abusive father Hiram. The authorities have attributed his death to a sturgeon attack. (That's apparently a real thing with east coast species.) But the Altamaha is a wild river, with more than its share of illegal activities, and older brother Lawton, a Navy SEAL who bore the brunt of their father's temper and inherited some of it, suspects a more sinister explanation. Hunter, whose high school football injury pushed him down an academic path, is more interested in the history and mythology of the river.
Interspersed with the brothers' journey are glimpses of their father after he returned from Vietnam, the choices and misfortunes that made him even harder, and a dramatization (based on primary sources) of the first Europeans to travel up the Altamaha, an ill-fated French expedition in 1564. All three storylines fascinated me.
The Altamaha is a river of many kings: the original native kings who alternately allied with and fought against the European invaders, the redneck kings who run drugs and other illegal trade on the river, and a mysterious figure known as King Uncle, a childhood friend of Hiram's turned preacher turned wild man of the river. There's enough unknown in each plot to drive the story, and sufficiently lovely prose to make a very enjoyable read.
I'm shocked that fewer than 700 GR users have rated this one. Mr. Brown's most recent novel, [b:Gods of Howl Mountain|34964885|Gods of Howl Mountain|Taylor Brown|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1494814260s/34964885.jpg|56239882], has received more notice, but I think I liked this one more. Seriously, read this. It's good.