Reading the River: A Voyage Down the Yukon

by John Hildebrand

Book Overview

"John Hildebrand sets out in a canoe . . . to explore the great riverway of northwestern Canada and Alaska. . . . The geography is closely rendered and the characters especially sharply drawn. The country is filled with mad dropouts at river fish camps, good-hearted girls in the towns, sullen natives in tumbledown villages, cranky old-timers, terrible drunks and worse moralizers who live off the wild landscape and its abundant resources. . . ...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0299154947
• ISBN13: 9780299154943
• Release Date: February 1997
• Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press
• Length: 260 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.7"

Customer Reviews

Loved it!

I loved this book and enjoyed every page. I've been reading a lot of Alaskan/Northern frontier books and this is definitely one to put at the top of the list. The different people John met on his trip were fascinating. It's told in such a flowing and easy style, that you don't want to put it down. By the end, I envied not being able to take a trip like this myself.

Excellent. A marvel of a tale.

Having once been an Alaskan traveler myself, I found myself slightly skeptical before plucking this tattered book off the shelf. Everything I'd read of modern Alaska seemed wrong, off-key, and too liberal or too commercialized. But after skimming through a few pages, I was hooked. Never before have I found such wonderful, accurate descriptions of the land, its people, and the emotional tracks it leaves on a person. Somehow, I assumed I was alone in my journeys and my memoirs of Alaska, and unable to share them with people. Here is a man who has weaved together a beautiful adventure, honest and simple. I felt as though I was reading a diary of my own excursions in the North. Reading the River is definitely one of the best books I have ever read. I recommend it to anyone who has ever wondered what draws people away from the city, for those living in the city who craves the wild, and to every dreamer, explorer, and 'old-timer'.

Unexpected Treasure

A complete surprise. Much more than a travelogue or river guide. Excellent prose from a gifted writer. One of the best books I've read in years.

Sad but well written tour of the people on the Yukon

A well written book; good primer for anyone planning a Yukon River trip, or anyone who just likes good adventure reading. Ride down the river with author in his canoe-with-motor and see Alaska through the eyes of a now-grown hippie returning to Alaska to find the self he left behind years before.

A "coming of middle age" adventure down the Yukon

Hildebrand takes you from Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, across into Alaska, to the Arctic Circle at Fort Yukon, and through nearly the whole state of Alaska as he canoes down the Yukon River. Along the way you meet ordinary people with legendary stories of the intense lonliness of winter, of bear attacks, of battles with the US and Alaskan state governments, and of survival. You also get a glimpse into John's recently failed marraige, his life in Fairbanks, and his abandoned homestead near Denali National Park. Even for those who don't own SUVs or long to take on a thousand-mile canoe trip, this book is an intellectual adventure well worth the price of admission.