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   $28.00 Sale Hardcover add to wish list

   The Jazz Loft Project: Photographs and Tapes of W. Eugene Smith from 821 Sixth Avenue, 1957-1965

   Sam Stephenson and W. Eugene Smith

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Samwise, December 7, 2009 (view all comments by Samwise)
An interesting story of three teenagers coming of age in a small town. The book deals with issues of prejudice, freedom, and fitting in. The book is also a good area piece of northeastern Oregon.

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Polysorbate, August 7, 2009 (view all comments by Polysorbate)
The best coming of age novels tend to reflect some aspects of the readers’ youthful experiences: emotions, awkwardness, aging, social wars, friendships gained and lost, first loves, sexual exploration and the feeling of place in the town where you grew up.

Ricochet River is a masterfully crafted tale that weaves all these aspects together through three friends among the background of a river in a small Oregon town called Calamus.

But beyond the general questions of growing up, Ricochet River flows with an underlying theme of racial tensions in a small town and how it tests the bonds of friendship to their limits.

The setting is the mid-1960s in a fictional logging town about an hour drive from Portland, Oregon. Other geographic locations, however, are actual areas of the Pacific Northwest described in vivid detail, including the twists and turns of the Columbia and other rivers.

Wade, the narrator, is a high school senior descended from loggers and liked among the town’s denizens for his personality and academics, but even more so for his athletic prowess. His girlfriend, Lorna, feels an outcast in the small town and wants nothing more than to escape. And Jesse, an Indian who joins Wade’s high school as a junior transfer from elsewhere, lives in the present with a devil may care attitude, seemingly unconcerned about what the future may hold.

Their distinct personalities seethe through the pages of Ricochet River and Cody rarely fumbles through the narrative that so perfectly describes them, revealing that as much as they are different, they have a common bond beyond friendship.

Calamus is the most prominent character in the book, the foundation from which the characters derive their sense of place. It’s a town loaded with positives and negatives as the three develop their lives.

It all culminates into an ending that will leave the reader in stunned, satisfied silence when they close the book, which should be considered one of the better coming-of-age novels in recent decades, whether the reader lives in Oregon or elsewhere.

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kdlawrence, October 3, 2007 (view all comments by kdlawrence)
Having myself grown up in a small Oregon town in the 1960's, I can assure you that Robin Cody has accurately captured this experience for others to share. He has woven a rich tapestry, taking you into a one-industry community where local high school sports heroes reign supreme and small town mentality clashes with any thing, person or idea that--simply by being different--challenges the cherished status quo. Where bright young people who dream of a life beyond the city limits despair of ever escaping.

Robin Cody's profound understanding and respectful rendering of all cultures represented--small town citizens; timber industry working class; teenagers and Native Americans--makes him my Tony Hillerman of the Pacific Northwest.

Katherine Lawrence

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Product Details

ISBN:

9781932010046

Author:

Cody, Robin

Publisher:

Ooligan Press

Author:

Cody, Robin

Subject:

Historical - General

Subject:

General Fiction

Copyright:

2005

Publication Date:

April 2005

Binding:

Paperback

Grade Level:

General/trade

Language:

English

Pages:

272

Dimensions:

8.50x5.76x.73 in. .85 lbs.