shopping cart
Call us: 800-878-7323 HELP
McAfee SECURE helps keep you safe from identity theft, credit card fraud, spyware, spam, viruses and online scams.
Guests | October 20, 2009

Vincent McCaffrey: IMG A Practical Matter

2 comments By Vincent McCaffrey

It was in a letter of 1897, about his cousin James Ross Clemens, that Mark Twain famously noted that "the report of my death was an exaggeration." He... Continue »
  1. $16.80 Sale Hardcover add to wish list

    Hound: A Mystery

    Vincent McCaffrey

The River Why

by David James Duncan

The River Why Cover

ISBN13: 9781578050840
ISBN10: 1578050847
Condition: Standard
All Product Details

Only 3 left in stock at $10.50!

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Not in recent memory has there been such a unique and vibrant fictional character — a character who could make us laugh so easily, feel so deeply, who speaks with such startling truth about the way we live — as Gus Orviston, the irreverent young flyfisherman in The River Why.

Leaving behind a madcap, fishing-obsessed family, Gus embarks on an extraordinary voyage of self-discovery along his beloved Oregon rivers. What he unexpectedly finds is man's wanton destruction of nature and a burning desire to commit himself to its preservation.

Here then is the funny, sensitive, very special story of one man's search: for meaning, for love, and for a sane way to live...a tale that gives a contemporary voice to the concerns and hopes of all living things on this beautiful, watery planet Earth.

Review:

"A veritable epic....Moving, rhapsodic in its intensity." Publishers Weekly

Review:

"In the company of Catch-22 and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance." The Houston Post
back to top

About the Author

David James Duncan is the author of the novel The Brothers K; River Teeth, a joint memoir and collection of stories; and an essay collection, My Story as Told By Water. The River Why ranks thirty-fifth on the San Francisco Chronicle list of The 20th Century's 100 Best Books of the American West. The Brothers K is an American Library Association Best Books Award-winner and a New York Times Notable Book. Both novels won the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Award.

Duncan has read and lectured all over the United States on wilderness, the writing life, the nonmonastic contemplative life, the fly fishing life, and nonreligious literature of faith. His work has appeared in Harper's, Outside, Orion, The Sun, Sierra, Big Sky Journal, Northern Lights, Gray's Sporting Journal, and many other publications. He lives with his family on a Montana trout stream.

back to top

What Our Readers Are Saying

Add a comment for a chance to win!
Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Steven Winchester, October 27, 2008 (view all comments by Steven Winchester)
In addition to being a fantastic novel plot-wise, The River Why does an excellent job incorporating what so few novels do...extensive philosophical discussion. Viewed through the lens of a young man torn between his father's almost religious devotion to fly fishing and his mother's unswerving dedication to bait-fishing, we are exposed to the relevant issues of environmental stewardship and self-awareness. Everything his father holds dear comes from a treatise on angling, and everything his mother holds dear aims to antagonize her husband and masks itself as down-home common sense. As the main character, Gus, grows up and leaves home for a Waldenesque solitary existence fishing on a Pacific Northwest river, he finds himself questioning life, and even the merit of his favorite hobby - fishing. The degradation of the natural world seems to delegitimize this central element of his life, and he begins an inward journey of self-discovery. Love, friendship, knowledge and respect of one's landbase all come into play, and Duncan's quirky but intellectual humor pervades the text throughout. Reading The River Why not only enriches the reader's understanding of fishing, environmental issues and relationships...it enriches the reader's understanding of him/herself. A truly great piece of literature by a gifted author.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(8 of 12 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
back to top

Product Details

ISBN:
9781578050840
Author:
Duncan, David James
Publisher:
Sierra Club Books
Location:
San Francisco
Subject:
General
Subject:
Fishing
Subject:
Fly fishing
Subject:
Literary
Edition Number:
20
Edition Description:
Twentieth -Anni
Series Volume:
no. 10
Publication Date:
October 2002
Binding:
Paperback
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Y
Pages:
310
Dimensions:
840x576x85 94
back to top

Other books you might like

  1. $9.50 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    The Brothers K

    David James Duncan
  2. $5.63 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    To Kill a Common Loon

    Mitch Luckett
  3. $10.95 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    My Story as Told by Water: Confessions, Druidic Rants, Reflections, Bird-Watchings, Fish-Stalkings, Visions, Songs and Prayers Refracting Light, from Living Rivers, in the Age of the Industrial Dark

    David James Duncan
  4. $9.95 Used Hardcover add to wish list

    Best Essays NW: Perspectives from Oregon Quarterly

    Guy Maynard and Kathleen Holt
  5. $16.00 Used Hardcover add to wish list

    Snow Falling on Cedars

    David Guterson
  6. $10.95 Used Trade Paper add to wish list

    River Teeth

    David James Duncan
back to top

Related Aisles

  • back to top

Powell's City of Books is an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that fills a whole city block with more than a million new, used, and out of print books. Shop those shelves — plus literally millions more books, DVDs, and eBooks — here at Powells.com.