Alison's review
The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey
by Candice Millard
Alison's review
The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey by Candice Millard
Alison's review
rating:
I've been devouring real exploration tales recently, and this one is like candy. It's both enjoyable, and slightly mediocre like that artificial candy you get at restaurants when you pay your bill. The author has mastered a certain approach to adventure writing - suspense, chapters that end with cliffhangers, an uncomplicated writing style - but the pacing of the book is a bit off. I love the digressions about tribes in the Amazon, jungle flora and fauna, and countless other National Geographicky topics that arise, but they pop up throughout the book with no clear sense of why they were placed where they were placed. It's no Moby Dick, let's just say. But I totally enjoyed this book and recommend it. And the most valuable takeaways are revelations about Theodore Roosevelt - what an engaged, intelligent, kind and complicated man he was.
