Oregon Books

I love Kay Hooper. Anything she writes (and this has been so for years!) is a good read.

This was an entertaining read and I found it hard to put down. I loved reading Kay Hooper's stories when I first read "Haunting Rachel". Was not disappointed reading this story. It had just the right mystique and romance to keep me reading till I was finished. I liked this story better than the Shadow series, which had less romantic interest but still good suspense. I recommend highly "After Caroline" to all Kay Hooper fans! A MUST read. If you like this story, I recommend reading: "Finding Laura", "Amanda", and "Haunting Rachel".

Cliffside, how come she sees the sign for that small town in her dreams? How come two different people in Atlanta have called her Caroline when her name is Joanna? These are only two of the questions that have come to puzzle research librarian Joanna Flynn after her near fatal auto accident. Joanna, puts the clues together, finds out that a woman named Caroline McKenna, who is her exact age, died in an accident in Cliffside, Oregan at the same time she survived her own accident and to make matters even more coincidental, they could have been twins. Caroline goes to Oregon and finds more than she bargained for, more than anyone could have bargained for.

I enjoyed this five star, character driven book more than I can say, this book is so much more than a romance novel, so much more than even romantic suspense. Dean Koontz fans would appreciate this book.

Reviewed by Vesta Irene, Number One fan of Ken Douglas, writer of Dead Ringer, Desperation Moon & Running Scared. One of the advantages of being married to a writer is that there are plenty of good books around the house. It's turned me into quite a reader of mysteries and thrillers. In addition to Ken's books you might also want to check out Blood Dreams & Sleeping with Fear, two other fine thrillers by Kay Hooper.

Kay Hooper has become one of my favorite authors. After Caroline was a great romance suspense novel. I enjoyed it from the first page until the last page! I am currently reading Finding Laura now by Ms. Hooper and enjoying it also. I do not think anyone will be disappointed in this book one bit. It was very hard to put down.

Kay Hooper has become one of my favorite authors. After Caroline was a great romance suspense novel. I enjoyed it from the first page until the last page! I am currently reading Finding Laura now by Ms. Hooper and enjoying it also. I do not think anyone will be disappointed in this book one bit. It was very hard to put down.

I ordered this book based on the film, " The Oregan Trail," which I enjoyed watching. The book is a good follow-up to the movie, making much of the content even more real for me.

Parkman's travelogue on the Great Plains is a major work of life among the Native Americans. His descriptions are honest and capture a society that was fading even while he was writing. The book had a major impact on the way that non-westerners saw the Great Plains. This was both good and bad. Parkman wrote through the lens of a Boston aristocrat and was full of prejudices against those who did not meet his standards. This was dangerous in that many who read about the "backwardness" of the Native Americans used this as justification for "civilizing" them. Although this was probably not Parkman's intention, it was a consequence of his writing. In addition, he promoted the hunting of buffalo for sport, which led to the decimation of the buffalo heards on the Plains.

Another major issue with this book is that, in spite of its title, it is not about the Oregon Trail. Parkman went no further than the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains and he did all in his power to dissociate himself from the pioneers moving along the Oregon Trail. If you are looking for a history of the trail, this book will not satisfy your needs.

However, in spite of the misleading title and the prejudices that surface throughout the book, it is still a fine piece of writing that opens up a world that has been lost to today's readers. Read it and enjoy your travels into another time and place.

This is an excellent book giving the reader a first person view of the Frontier in the 1840s. The details make the reader feel as if they were living the adventure themselves.

If you are looking for a book that tells of a journey on the Oregon Trail, this is NOT the book for you. A better for the book title might have been "A Summer On The Frontier: Life Among The Indians and Explorers." The author follows the Oregon Trail until he reaches Fort Laramie, and then spends the rest of his time among the indians who inhabited the plains and badlands at the time.

If you are looking for vivid picture of life among the indians, buffaloes, and explorers, this IS the book for you!

In a day when "historians" make comment on the long dead or events from the confines of their apartments, Francis Parkman is the person who actually experienced the history he wrote about. There is no political correctness in Parkman and he describes savages, French, frontiersmen and Mormons exactly as they were without apology.
This work is a masterpiece everyone should read and be a guidebook to modern historians who spend more time working a political end and getting in the way of history rather than letting history tell it's truthful tale.
Parkman is not just the historian or recorder of events. He is the bard of Sioux myth, the geologist, biologist and countless other things describing flora, fauna and weather. He is complete in having that air of Boston social elite in beginning his journey and returning from the plains an American having tasted, smelled and breathed the savage world and revealed the eastern thoughts on how that world would evolve for the next 60 years.
Parkman is remarkable and the best compliment for this book is to recommend that readers search for other Parkman histories to read as they are real.
I am currently in his wonderful Montecalm and Wolfe series on the history of Canada which actually created America. If you have children, share Parkman's history with them as he will make it come alive for them.
As you can see by all of the lengthy reviews, Francis Parkman invokes a great deal of thought and emotion in his histories which transfers to the reader.

The Oregon Trail by Francis Parkman is an account which further enforces the history of the Oregon Trail we had learned about in [U.S. History] class. The book portrays what it must have been like to travel on the Trail, never knowing what the next day would bring. The buffalo hunting which took place throughout the book became monotonous and boring after the first exciting few, but other than that repetitiveness, the journey was well depicted. I especially enjoyed Parkman's in-depth descriptions given to the reader of the people he meets on his journey and his observations on their actions as well. His vivid imagery of scenes from nature such as animals, prairie landscapes, and the weather, place the reader right next to Parkman in his adventuresome expedition. There are some dull, repetitive points in the observations made by the author, but aside from that his autobiographical telling of his journey is unforgettable.

Nancy Warren is a delightful author! I meant to give her 5 stars for The One That I Want and I guess I didn't click on the stars hard enough. Sorry about that, Nancy. I love your work and your stories. I pay attention on Amazon now for any of your books and move them to my cart. Nancy Warren writes the kind of books that make you sit down, read and lose track of time. Once again, I enjoyed the characters and the twists and turns in Drive Me Crazy. Can't wait for the next book!

I was ready to devour Warren's novel, Drive Me Crazy, but the characters were stereotypes and the writing was just so-so and soured quickly. How many times to I have to read about Duncan looking like a man who spent time in the sun? Sheesh. Also, Warren may have wished to do some research on librarians before writing about them. Librarians must have a master's degree to do their work. It is not beneath Alex to take the job. Many are young, hip, and even like to wear leather. She's portrayed as a tightly wound spring just waiting to be unsprung, but she just seems brittle. Also, Goosebumps would not likely be shelved in Dewey Decimal order. Other meaningless little things that made the book seem annoying and the work so someone who doesn't spend much time in a library.

Drive Me Crazy by Nancy Warren is a great mix of mystery and two great romances. Duncan is in search of stolen painting and finds the last known link being a very hot librarian brings him to his knees. If you enjoy this genre, I would also suggest Glory Days by Irene Peterson, The Ice House by Minette Walters and Squeeze Play by Kate Angell.

I really enjoy Nancy Warren's work. One reviewer said that Ms. Warren needed to research for her book because librarians need master's degrees, but Ms. Warren said exactly that within the first few pages of the book. I think Nancy gave her characters solid characterizations and motivations. Her work is sexy and fun.

Known in academic circles as "the Indiana Jones of the Art World," Duncan Forbes is in a sleepy Oregon village on the trail of a stolen Van Gogh painting. He suspects that Alex, the sexy town librarian knows where it is stashed. His sources tell him that her grandfather was involved in the plot to get the paining out of Europe during WW2. But before he can drill her for information, a dead body shows up in the library.

Soon an investigation ensues, throwing Alex and Duncan together, where they act on their smoldering feelings for each other. The chemistry between these two leaps off the pages.

The storyline is made all the more compelling with the colorful secondary characters including the second-chance romance between Alex's cousin Gillian and her former beau Tom, now a police officer.

Part suspense, part romance and part comedy, this one has something for everyone!

An incredibly beautiful journal written by a young child prodigy. It is lyrical and delightful. A wonderful book.

This book is the diary of a six-year-old girl named Opal Whiteley, who grew up in Oregon logging camps in the early 1900s. She loved nature and her writing style was inimitably beautiful.

Her diary was published first in 1920, but became the centre of a large controversy and was dismissed as a fraud. Mr Hoff discovered a copy of this book by chance in 1983, and was so fascinated by it that he spent years researching the life of Opal to determine the true story.

It most certainly is no fraud. Mr Hoff opens this book with a very well-researched, unbiased biography of Opal which proves beyond doubt that this really was her diary written at age six. He follows this up with the diary (or what exists of it), and ends with the tale of his story of trying to meet Opal personally.

The tone of the book, by the time you have read from beginning to end, is one of tragedy. However, like the lonely, brave tones of a bird chirping through the twilight its farewell to the setting sun and a day that shall never return, beauty sometimes IS bitter sweet; but the quiet love, the charming way Opal describes her surroundings, her pets, the people she meets, and the voices of the natural world which Opal understood so well balance out the sadness and make this book well worth reading and adding to your personal collection.

Opal's story is at once a sad commentary on the way one small hint of a rumour can snowball into the destruction of a person's life and a celebration of childhood and nature. It is mostly the latter.

This is a brief passage from the diary part of the book, to give you a sample of its simplistic yet profound loveliness.

"And all the times I was picking up potatoes, I did have conversations with them. Too, I did have thinks of all their growing days here in the ground, and all the things they did hear. Earth-voices are glad voices, and earth-songs come up from the ground through the plants; and in their flowering, and in the days before these days are come, they do tell the earth-songs to the wind. And the wind in her goings does whisper them to folks to print for other folks, so other folks do have knowing of earth's songs. When I grow up, I am going to write for children - and grownups that haven't grown up too much - all the earth-songs I now do hear."

Doesn't that just sound like such music?

Please read this book. Take it to heart.

And thank you, Mr Hoff, for your loving tribute to an amazing woman, and for the hard work you did to bring this masterpiece back into the public eye.

To say this is my favorite book of all time, my most treasured, the one I would grab in a housefire - that is just a beginning. Opal brings us into the innocence and wonder of childhood in a way that inspires us to reclaim that part of ourselves. There are haunting scenes that pull you to love her and precious glimpses into her imaginings that wake you up to the magic in life. As she trots around with critters in her pockets and on her shoulders with names inspired by the great writers, christens baby chicks in the barn and finds notes and ribbons left by the fairies in the woods, Opal delights us and opens our hearts to a more tender place.

This beautiful, lyrical journal, written by a 6-year-old prodigy from the backwoods of Oregon, will have you gazing in wonder at fire hydrants and listening to the song of the subways. Opal has a direct relationship with every tree, horse, rat and blade of grass in her backyard, and is able to see every living thing as a gift from God.

The story behind the publication of the journal is a sad one, but the diary itself is timeless and transcendent. Opal may have died in obscurity but her lovely spirit lives on in her work.

I'm a huge fan of Benjamin Hoff. Who is a spiritual writer that a guy like me (who doesn't keep "earth crystals" in pocket or wreak of Nag Champa) can get into. I could go on glowingly about the passion that Hoff applies while exploring his subject. I would be someone pointed out to me that Hoff had been discredited by Katherine Beck. So I'm kind of writing a dual review using Beck's book as a jumping off point.

Some facts about Beck's book:

1) Beck never really discredits Opal for writing the book when she claimed: she admits that:
a) Opal was incredibly bright as a teenager, bizzarely aware of the latin names of plants and animals. beck admits that by 15 or she was already a prodigy. But never attempts to explain how that related to possibly she could have been a brilliant writer as a child.
b) Beck claims in response to forensic information favorable to at least part of Opal's story, that Opal planned the hoax by saving old scraps of paper and crayons from her childhood for 10 or 15 years and moving with to multiple houses and states to write the diary, appearantly hedging against future forensic technology, then torn her work to shreds and left it in jeopardy in a place where it could have been destroyed just to really sell people on it's authenticity. Also as native of the Willamete Valley I've met people who can recreate her journeys, which would have been hard to fake from a distance. That's about as crazy as any claims Opal made about the book.
c) Beck gives examples of other child authors of the time who she feels were better writers, so why would be inconcievable to her that a substandard counterpart would exist? She doesn't even touch on it.
2) Beck doesn't like Opal at all, she doesn't like her writing, kind implies she was harlot and a racist, and worst of all for me personally; she's glib about Opal's crippling mental illness.
3) Beck seems affectionate for amatuer Opalites but seems to think people like Hoff and Nassif are nuts and paints Boulton as criminally Naive. She doesn't seem think Opal should be taught in schools, or at least thinks its screwball.
4) Beck takes no time to really examine the spiritual significance of the book, except to say she thinks it's pre-new age tripe. To Beck it was popular at the time because people were gulliable and if it's getting a comeback now it must be for the same reason.

Even being horder of Opal related history I got bored because reading someone's account of how much they dislike someone who was at worst kind of a liar and bad writer (remember it's not like Opal was dictator or anything) gets really, really tedious after about 50 pages. Also discrediting the most widely discredited author of the last 100 years is not an exciting read. I think the Seattle Times called it "Myopic" which it is, that and commendably thorough and also kind of spiteful. I've been trying to find people to disscuss the book with who aren't Opalites, who dispise Beck. I did talk to one guy who hates Opal and Opalites for very personal reasons but he was a little bored by the book and didn't finish it. The same man read Hoff and praised his writing but didn't see Opal's appeal.

Now, Hoff, by contrast, is over flowing with praise for Opal. Beck interestingly "uncovers" a fact printed in book. Hoff was in love Opal, or the concept of her. So we can't call him biased. He presents a rosy picture of the girl who obiviously had a darkside. At the same time I like Hoff because he comes to the most rational conclusion about the book: It was written by a highly functional abused little schitzophrenic girl, and likely futzed with later in her life. Opal is a tragic figure to anyone who sees beauty in her wierd prose and a non-sequitor for anyone who doesn't. Hoff isn't bias free but no one is biasless about Opal. Also his repackaging of the diary is in my opinion the definitive version. Hoff is a brilliant counterpart in the present day to Opal. Who is due for a looking over outside of the neigh-sayers and new-agers.

Following on the heels of his beguiling Felicia's Journey, the incomparable Irish storyteller, William Trevor, brings us a collection of 12 poignant tales that illuminate the human condition.

Acknowledged by many to be the master of his oeuvre, Trevor commands our attention with dignity and subtlety. Amazingly adept at shifting perspectives from male to female in varying locations and scenes, the author's championship form is evident in After Rain.

His initial offering, "The Piano Tuner's Wives" is an incisive rendering of a middle-aged second wife's jealousy. Haunted by the happiness her husband once shared with another, she seeks to establish her place in surprising ways.

A lifelong bond between two women is broken in "A Friendship" when the clever plotting of one backfires. Timothy, the gay protagonist, in "Timothy's Birthday" seems to seek to punish his parents for their perfect marriage. He refuses to visit them for his birthday celebration as he has always done. Instead, he sends a friend with an excuse. The disreputable Eddie delivers his hurtful message, then steals from the older couple.

Trevor's spare prose shimmers in this story's summary paragraph: "They didn't mention their son as they made their rounds of the garden that was now too much for them and was derelict in places. They didn't mention the jealousy their love of each other had bred in him, that had flourished into deviousness and cruelty. The pain the day had brought would not easily pass, both were aware of that. And yet it had to be, since it was part of what there was."

Another story takes place in the fields of Ireland today. Here, Trevor displays his gift for knowing the female heart as a young woman challenges the culture and mores bred into her parents' bones.

Trevor's work is meat compared to the broth of some of today's fiction. He continues to astound as he explores the complexities of family relationships with sympathetic candor. After Rain is one more triumph.

- Gail Cooke

It's a dismal commentary on the state of contemporary readership when this book has not been reviewed on Amazon for almost five years. After Rain is top-shelf literature, an excellent introduction to William Trevor's mastery of the short story. Of particular note are: Timothy's Birthday, Gilbert's Mother, A Day and Marrying Damian. (Curiously, I found the title story somewhat muddled, but I'm convinced I missed something and I'll be re-reading it soon.)

As others here have mentioned, what distinguishes Trevor is his ability to handle a great variety of points of view (frequently within the same story) and his lack of condescension as he subtly presents the failings of his characters. A great eyewitness to the human drama. I seriously believe these stories are the equals of those in Joyce's Dubliners.

Like Grieg in the musical sphere, and Cheever in the literary one, William Trevor seems to be at his best in the smaller forms, where his sharply etched insights and compellingly profound characterization can glitter without the "imposition" of relaxation dictated by the novel. Reading his "Collected Stories" was among my favorite literary "events" of the past 20 years (since reading, of all things, Dreiser's "An American Tragedy" [talk about strange bedfellows!]), and if the present volume seems a bit less well-stocked with masterpieces than the earlier, larger collection, it also shows Trevor polishing his craft to an almost superhuman degree. Every word tells.

A couple of the stories in "After Rain" struck me as surprisingly weak: "The Piano Tuner's Wives," in which an elderly man's second wife contrives to distort his happy memories of his first, seemed architecturally imbalanced: the second wife was drawn with less fecundity than the first and as a result the cutting insights of the story's end seemed like the proverbial "too little, too late." The other relative disappointment for me was "A Day," in which a married woman meditates on her husband's infidelity. Maybe it was that the central character seemed annoyingly passive, but to my mind Trevor added little to a situation that has been visited many times before.

The bulk of the remainder of the stories was exceptionally fine, though, particularly "A Friendship," which limns the dissolving of a lifelong relationship between two women at one of their husband's instigation.

However, the real gems of the collection, in my opinion, were "Child's Play" and "Lost Ground," which may be among the finest short stories written. The first is spare and knife-edged, the second weighty and full of tragedy. In "Child's Play," two children of divorce play act, with uncanny accuracy, their parents' sordid affairs, but when something happens to threaten the children's own relationship, their sudden reversion to reality proves more poignant and devastating than any play they can put on. "Lost Ground," the longest and perhaps greatest story in the collection, tells the tale of a Protestant family, one of whose sons is visited by, and asked to carry the word of, a Catholic saint. By encapsulating the religious conflicts in Northern Ireland in the guise of a single family, Trevor manages to comment on the intolerance of humankind while presenting a family drama of piercing sorrow.

I read recently that some people find Trevor's works offputtingly depressing. Maybe so; there are no happy endings here and virtually no happy people. Perhaps his truths are just too painful for a few to face. But then, sometimes, life is that way too.

"After Rain" is a stellar proof that William Trevor is one of the most respected Irish short story writers. As a literary artist, Trevor is known for his elegant and hushed rendering of the psychic state of his characters. In addition, Trevor is also a humanist of great empathy, allowing him to uncover hidden or neglected angles of seemingly pedestrian situations. One story in this collection, "Gilbert's Mother," amply demonstrates Trevor's empathy. The story opens with a crime scene, told from an objective, clinical tone akin to a newspaper report. Just when you expect the next scene to develop the mystery further, Trevor switches the lens to a bystander, a woman, who, for the remainder of the story, contemplates whether her troubled son would be capable of committing such a crime. Trevor developed her skillfully, weaving with ease strained dealings between mother and son, as well as painful details of her past. The true crime to be solved here is how external circumstances beyond our control irrevocably sever our emotional ties from our loved ones, preventing us from ever knowing them fully.

A few pieces in this collection seem less inspired and not as well-executed. Some authorial comments that serve to wrap up stories seem forced. And as much as I admire Trevor the stylist, the elegance of language may border on the self-righteous when situations described do not warrant such treatment--minor quibbles in an otherwise fine collection.

Highly Readable, Highly Enjoyable. Just what you would expect from Trevor. In a clear and simple style he writes about ordinary lives, and when you finish you realize there is nothing ordinary about them.

Jane Kirkpatrick's compassionate insight brings history to life. I always feel as if I am part of the lives of her characters, and feel a sadness when the story ends, as if I am saying goodbye to friends. This trilogy based on the life of Marie Deroin is no exception. Although highly honored for her part in history, she was undoubtedly human as we all are, and her commitment to family is close to my own heart as a woman, daughter, wife, mother, and friend.
I now have my sisters "hooked" on Jane's novels.

This series of three books, is one of the most beautiful, heart-warming stories, I have ever read. Living in the Northwest, made it even more interesting.

Jan Kirkpatrick's books keep me coming back. Her characters are so real that I feel I recognize parts of them in the "real" people I know and my own life experiences. I was born in Eastern Oregon and my ancestors traveled the Oregon Trail to settle in the Heppner and Echo area. The accurate history that Jan weaves through her stories is fascinating. Madame Dorion is a strong woman that listened to her heart and kept searching for the thing that would satisfy that empty longing not met by the people in her life. Great story.

I was not thrilled or excited by anything I read in this book...I found it dull and threw it in the trash before I finished it. Too much using of french words which an ordinary person has no understanding of and I don't want to take time to figure them out as I try to hold on to the plot.

After reading the "All Together In One Place", I was expecting a lot more from the Tender Ties series. It's not that they aren't particularly good, they're just not as good as the others of Jane Kirkpatrick's that I've read. The timelines are a little harder to follow because they sometimes skip ahead months and even years. Like I said, it's not that these aren't good books, they just aren't quite what I've come to expect from her.

Want a book that holds your interest? I recommend this entire series. I discovered Gunn on accident; really it was a blessing! I liked this entire series. Good wholesome values and interesting plots that intertwine with the other books.

If you have read the other books in this series, you won't want to miss Woodlands. It will not disappoint you! I have read through the complete series 4 times. This series is a "Must Have."

Robin Jones Gunn writes awsome books and brings her characters alive. I've read the whole series and this is one of the best. It is a wonderful romance amoung man and woman and woman and God! It's worth the money and the time.

All of the Glenbrooke series is awsome, but this one is tops on my list. You feel as if your taken into the book and go on the journey with Leah. I recommend all of Robin Jones Gunn books, she is an amazing author. This book, especially is worth your time and money.

I thought this was the best book in her series because Leah seemed so much like so many people I know. She was such a giving, loving person-beautiful inside and out, but did not feel like she was. So when she meets a wonderful man and he sees her beauty it is so sweet. She had so many negative voices from her childhood, especially the ones referring to her name, to overcome to accept love that it was an inspiration to me.

...this series is too dark and violent for me. I'll stick with Tinker.

A bit out there, I enjoy fantasy more then SF and the basis of this series is a bit difficult for me to believe, but the writer is so good, that I have read the entire series and found I could not put any of these books down... A Great Read..!

Bitter Waters, the third in the Ukiah Oregon series and sets up the story for the forth one. These books are better if read in order,otherwise you will end up confused. This is a good series, I liked every one of them and wish the author would write more of them. The relationships between the charactors is why I enjoyed this series as much as I did. Along with Hex there are knew protagonists in this book. I can't go into the story line w/o spoilers, so I will just tell you that the books are worth reading, and I liked them enough that I will get any other books that the author writes.

This was the first book by this author that I had read, and although I read it out of order for the series and was rather confused, I still enjoyed it immensely. One of the advertising blurbs said "Don't plan on getting anything else done if you start a Wen Spencer novel; they are exceedingly hard to put down!" So true. I read it in one day and then went scrambling to get the other three in the series. My only regret is that now I have read them all and wish there were more. Definitely a keeper. Alien invaders, kidnapped babies, government agents, plenty of action and mystery.

"Bitter Waters" picks up where "Tainted Trail" left off -- litterally, one day later. U. and his partner, M., are private detectives. They arrive home and are immediately drawn into investigating child kidnappings and a cult that has turned to crime. If you haven't read the previous books, U. is an alien pretending to be a human, and the detective work is greatly complicated by alien threats to Earth.

My problems with "Bitter Waters" were twofold. First, if you have read the previous novel, the beginning of this one goes really slowly. After the first 57 pages, there really isn't any reason to go back and read either "Tainted Trail" or the book before, because you've just read it. To be fair, I prefer stand alone books to sequels. Second, the main plot is that U.'s son is kidnapped, and I abhor kidnapped children plots, particularly when the main character's child is kidnapped. I'm a parent, and this just isn't a laughing matter for me.

I recommend this novel to people who don't mind kidnapped children plots and either haven't read Spencer's U. books before or adore sequels. All else is well done.

WHile this book seemed a bit tedious for me to get through...i did enjoy it for the most part, especially Petie and Eddie. I am anxious to read another Dianne Hammond book.

On page 160 I thought....well, when is something going to happen? This book went nowhere, and while it was fast reading to.. nowhere, I found it to be a waste of my time. I find it amazing that I am the only reviewer that found the book to be uneventful, and not even that exciting when trying to establish the bond between the two girls. How mundane, and how pathetic, that the most interesting thing about this book was the soup!!!

I enjoyed this book in general. The characters were interesting, and the story moved along at a nice pace. I enjoyed how the author went into the background of the characters and explained why they were the way they were. But, i do have a bone to pick with the author. I grew up on the Oregon Coast, in a small town, and have lived here for 39 years. I began reading the book and within two chapters i knew not only was this author not from here, but had some misconceptions of how the coast works. ( i read later that she is from the east coast and lives in newport or). I don't appreciate that the characters were not only all very uneducated, but they all lived in very bad mobile homes or shacks. The character from LA had to get bagels there because obviously the backward morons in this town did not know what a bagel was. Give me a break! The character from LA also stated that she had trouble conversing with the locals, that she had to resort to body language. I understand the book is fiction and not supposed to be an accurate picture of coastal life, but does everyone have to be involved in incest, unemployment, poverty, and child abuse? Overall it was a good book, but over and over I was offended by how the coastal residents were portrayed. Do your homework next time.

This is the story of 2 remarkable women who transcend their upbringing, circumstances, and environment. More remarkable, is how well written this first novel by Diane Hammond is. Her particular talent is to make even a series of ordinary events absolutely compelling. While the women have a marvelous friendship, it is real and nuanced. The secondary characters are naturally drawn.

What a wonderful debut novel. I could just eat it up with a spoon.
Encore, please! From the delightful coastal underbelly setting to the juxtaposition of characters, gritty and soothing, rebellious and sensitive, flirty and horrified, I was hooked from beginning to end.

This was a great read. I love reading trail journals and this book was no exception.

A hilarious romp through the wilds of North America. Anyone thinking about hiking the PCT should definitely buy this book!

Now I want to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. The story is well told, a real page turner. Well written, very interesting, and an inspiration for getting myself on a trail.

This book was an easy read, but disappointing in its lack of photos and descriptions of life on the trail and destinations seen.

Although I commend the author for his courage and humor, some things about the book distracted from reading pleasure. This read like a self-published book (maybe it is) that had not been edited at all. There were no paragraph indents, and many sentences were run-on (strung together with commas when there sould have been a period). I'm not a stickler about grammar, but this was distracting and made it hard to read. There was also a problem with tense and scenes suddenly switching. For example, in a camping scene, the author would suddenly mention that he saw 3 bears while camping, but it turned out that this was referring to something that would happen several chapters later, so that during the present scene I would wonder, "Where are the bears?" Often I would hope for an interesting scene only to be disappointed by a blow by blow of each day and night on the trail (including the days where nothing really happened). If you can deal with the amateur style, you may enjoy this book.