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Synopses & Reviews
From the New York Times-bestselling author of Matterhorn and What It Is Like to Go to War, a rich family saga about Finnish immigrants who settle and tame the Pacific Northwest, set against the early labor movements, World War I, and the upheaval of early twentieth-century America
Karl Marlantes's debut novel Matterhorn has been hailed as a modern classic of war literature. In his new novel, Deep River, Marlantes turns to another mode of storytelling — the family epic — to craft a stunningly expansive narrative of human suffering, courage, and reinvention.
In the early 1900s, as the oppression of Russia's imperial rule takes its toll on Finland, the three Koski siblings — Ilmari, Matti, and the politicized young Aino — are forced to flee to the United States. Not far from the majestic Columbia River, the siblings settle among other Finns in a logging community in southern Washington, where the first harvesting of the colossal old-growth forests begets rapid development, and radical labor movements begin to catch fire. The brothers face the excitement and danger of pioneering this frontier wilderness — climbing and felling trees one-hundred meters high — while Aino, foremost of the books many strong, independent women, devotes herself to organizing the industry's first unions. As the Koski siblings strive to rebuild lives and families in an America in flux, they also try to hold fast to the traditions of a home they left behind.
Layered with fascinating historical detail, this is a novel that breathes deeply of the sun-dappled forest and bears witness to the stump-ridden fields the loggers, and the first waves of modernity, leave behind. At its heart, Deep River is an ambitious and timely exploration of the place of the individual, and of the immigrant, in an America still in the process of defining its own identity.
Review
"A riveting read in the classic western literature tradition of Wallace Stegner's The Big Rock Candy Mountain, delivering the rich pleasures of an epic story well told...The realism of Deep River comes with a magical tinge." Oregonian
Review
"Marlantes conveys the elements, arcana and dangerous romance of logging superbly. His descriptions of logging itself — the ingenious mechanics of taking down trees and the skill of experienced loggers — are wonderfully detailed, dramatic and exhilarating...Mighty physical, social and economic forces operate the plot of this novel, buffeting its characters, raising them up, flinging them down, twisting their fates together. Deep River is a big American novel." Wall Street Journal
Review
"Deep River seems a work born from Willa Cather by way of Upton Sinclair. But this new book is its own animal, and it's something of a masterpiece...In Deep River, [Aino] takes her place beside Antonia Shimerda as one of the great heroines of literature." BookPage (Starred Review)
About the Author
Karl Marlantes grew up in a logging town on the Oregon coast, commercial fishing with his grandfather. He graduated from Yale University and was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, before serving as a Marine in Vietnam. He is the bestselling author of Matterhorn and What It Is Like to Go to War. He lives in rural Washington.