The River

Starred review from January 1, 2019
Two college friends' leisurely river trek becomes an ordeal of fire and human malice.For his fourth novel, Heller swaps the post-apocalyptic setting of his previous book, The Dog Stars (2012), for present-day realism--in this case a river in northern Canada where Dartmouth classmates Jack and Wynn have cleared a few weeks for fly-fishing and whitewater canoeing. Jack is the sharp-elbowed scion of a Colorado ranch family, while Wynn is a more easygoing Vermonter--a divide that becomes more stark as the novel progresses--but they share a love of books and the outdoors. They're so in sync early on that they agree to lose travel time to turn back and warn a couple they'd overheard arguing that a forest fire is fast approaching. It's a fateful decision: They discover the woman, Maia, near death and badly injured, apparently by her homicidal husband, Pierre. When Wynn unthinkingly radios Pierre that she's been found alive, Wynn and Jack realize they're now targets as well. Heller confidently manages a host of tensions--Jack and Wynn becoming suspicious of each other while watching for Pierre, straining to keep Maia alive, and paddling upriver to reach civilization and escape the nearing blaze. And his pacing is masterful as well, briskly but calmly capturing the scenery in slower moments, then running full-throttle and shifting to barreling prose when danger is imminent. (The fire sounds like "turbines and the sudden shear of a strafing plane, a thousand thumping hooves in cavalcade, the clamor and thud of shields clashing, the swelling applause of multitudes....") And though the tale is a familiar one of fending off the deadliness of the wilderness and one's fellow man, Heller has such a solid grasp of nature (both human and the outdoors) that the storytelling feels fresh and affecting. In bringing his characters to the brink of death (and past it), Heller speaks soberly to the random perils of everyday living.An exhilarating tale delivered with the pace of a thriller and the wisdom of a grizzled nature guide.

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January 1, 2019
Taking time off from jobs and classes, Dartmouth pals and consummate outdoorsmen Jack and Wynn, "diehards nostalgic for the days of the voyageurs," undertake a weeks-long canoe trip in Northern Canada. Colorado rancher's son Jack is the quicker-witted, tougher of the two, while Wynn's sensitive connection to nature stems from his Vermont youth spent steeped in art and literature. The boys' fluency with one another and the rugged landscape is quickly tested, though, by an encroaching wildfire and their unknowing entry into an argument between the married couple they try to warn about it. Disasters, growing in severity, eat away at their provisions and their sanity. Heller (Celine, 2017) once again chronicles life-or-death adventure with empathy for the natural world and the characters who people it. He writes most mightily of the boys' friendship and their beloved, uncompromising wilderness, depicting those layers of life that lie far beyond what is more commonly seen: the fire's unapologetic threats, the wisdom of the birds and animals seeking their own safety, and the language of the river itself.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)

Starred review from January 1, 2019

"They'd been smelling smoke for days." So opens Heller's fourth novel (after Celine), foretelling a disastrous outcome for what begins as a leisurely canoe trip by best friends Jack and Wynn. Experienced wilderness instructors, they paddle through creeks, white water, and a river in northern Ontario and soon encounter a creepy pair of drunk campers, whom they try to warn about the oncoming wildfire. When they hear a couple arguing at another campsite, they decide not to interfere, but the husband, Pierre, later arrives at their campsite disoriented and disheveled because wife Maia has disappeared into the woods after their argument and never returned. When Jack and Wynn travel back upstream to search for her, they find her barely alive, but how was she injured? The drunk campers? Pierre? A bear? Jack and Wynn find further trouble when they return to their campsite, and the two men are tested beyond endurance, with tragic results. VERDICT Using an artist's eye to describe Jack and Wynn's wilderness world, Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist Heller has transformed his own outdoor experiences into a heart-pounding adventure that's hard to put down. [See Prepub Alert, 9/10/18.]--Donna Bettencourt, Mesa Cty. P.L., Grand Junction, CO

"They'd been smelling smoke for days." So opens Heller's fourth novel (after Celine), foretelling a disastrous outcome for what begins as a leisurely canoe trip by best friends Jack and Wynn. Experienced wilderness instructors, they paddle through creeks, white water, and a river in northern Ontario and soon encounter a creepy pair of drunk campers, whom they try to warn about the oncoming wildfire. When they hear a couple arguing at another campsite, they decide not to interfere, but the husband, Pierre, later arrives at their campsite disoriented and disheveled because wife Maia has disappeared into the woods after their argument and never returned. When Jack and Wynn travel back upstream to search for her, they find her barely alive, but how was she injured? The drunk campers? Pierre? A bear? Jack and Wynn find further trouble when they return to their campsite, and the two men are tested beyond endurance, with tragic results. VERDICT Using an artist's eye to describe Jack and Wynn's wilderness world, Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist Heller has transformed his own outdoor experiences into a heart-pounding adventure that's hard to put down. [See Prepub Alert, 9/10/18.]--Donna Bettencourt, Mesa Cty. P.L., Grand Junction, CO