Deep River: A Novel

Even though this is a work of fiction, it took me back to my child hood. Literally, I could smell the forest, feel and here the falling logs, smell the men, see the whipcord shirts and shagged off jeans. Hear the cork boots on the porch, hear the head rig scream as it bit into a new log.Another memory, up the road from us lived an old Finnish lady, Mrs. Peattila. Us kids would go visit her and we always had coffee with lots of cream and drank it through a sugar cube.Bottom line, read this book. It is a great story. It may not bring back memories for you but you will be able to join the characters as they find their way here in America.

A generational story that rings home the plight of worker before unions while illustrating the importance of family and friends.

I really enjoy history like this that shows how our ancestors struggled to survive in the rough frontier. As I read this book I realized that the same situations came up over and over again and began to be unrealistic. The character Aino is thrown into jails many times and is beaten and mistreated for her beliefs in the Marxist Ideology . She also loses her family by her actions. One character has too many different logging operations to be realistic. I finally quit reading the book about two thirds of the way through.

It is amazing how much of this book is common to me. I am 52 percent Finnish and 48 percent Swedish. I was born in Astoria, Oregon and raised in Svensen. Many of the places mentioned in the story I have been to and many of the type of people described I have met. I’ve shopped on Commercial Street, watched movies in the Liberty Theater, drank beer in the Desdemona Club, played my accordion at Suomi Hall, and took my new bride, Jane, from Alaska to the Union Steam Bath. It’s part of me.The book starts out with some people and living conditions in Finland in 1905. My Dad, --------- was 10 years old in Finland at the time. From the conditions described it’s no wonder he immigrated to Svensen, Oregon in 1913. He started working in the woods as a high rigger as described in the book.The Deep River area is also common ground. My grandfather, -------- (later changed to ---------), immigrated from Sweden to the Grey’s River area near Deep River in southwestern Washington in the late 1800’s. My Grandmother, ----------, immigrated from Finland to Grey’s River about the same time. After marriage they moved to Astoria, Oregon where he and some others got together and started the Union Fisherman’s Cannery in the Uniontown area of Astoria in 1897. He was manager when he retired to Svensen, Oregon in 1933 or 35 depending on which book you read.The description in the book of logging south of Svensen also triggered some memories. He mentioned they didn’t run a railroad to the logging site but used trucks instead. I remember some of those chain drive log trucks that came down the Svensen Market road with mostly one log loads.The description in the book of walking in among the virgin timber was right on. Also, and I don’t know what the arrangement was, my Dad would go up into the logged over area and pick out a huge broken log to buck into furnace wood. He had a couple of 8 and 10 ft crosscut saws in our garage but he preferred to use the new type motor driven “buck” saw. It was not a chain saw. It was a reciprocating saw with a flywheel and arm that pulled the buck saw blade back and forth through the cut. I think it was also called a “Drag” saw as I think the blade was made to only cut on the drag.Another commonality with the book was the description of the residual stumps left by the loggers. My parents had 4 stumps of the same description left on their 5 acres on the now called “Hunt” road in Svensen. They were about 10 to 12 feet high, 8 to 12 feet in diameter, and still had very visible “spring board” holes. I didn’t care to climb them as a kid as they were too high to jump from. My Dad worked on and off trying to cut them down to use the ground, but they were so big it was an almost futile task. He only had two knocked down by the time I left home.Anyway, this is an excellent story even without the romp through my childhood.--------------

What did I like? Everything. This novel has well developed characters, plenty of history of the early logging days of the great Northwest and an incredibly humane look at socialism vs. capitalism -- without, I think, choosing sides.The book begins like a family saga. Members of a Finnish family move to the wilds of the Washington/Oregon forests to begin a new life around the turn of the century. Marlantes shows us just how hard life was. The forests were so thick and the trees so huge that you could not farm until you burned the stumps. No, they were too big to be pulled out by horses. Imagine plowing in a sea of stumps and snags. Like contemporary immigrants from our own continent, these are hard-working people displaced by poverty and politics. At the beginning, it might seem like a Northwest version of My Antonia, but just as you settle into a nice family saga of making it in a new land, the novel transitions to a struggle between capitalists and the rights of workers (socialism or maybe even communism). This is put in very human terms as the sister becomes an organizer for the Wobblies while her brothers work like crazy to start and succeed at their own capitalist ventures. But this book is much more than that. There are love stories, babies, lost family members, great sins and redemption. We see our characters struggle with The Great War, Prohibition and, of course, eventually the Depression. And given the current debate over immigration in this country, I was gratified to see the author document how hard and driven the people were who built our country's in its early years. Yet, then, as now, their loyalty was questioned. In the novel's case, this happens to union organizers born in Sweden and Finland even after they risk their lives for America in World War I. I don't know if it is comforting or depressing that some things never change.I enjoyed Marlantes last novel, Matterhorn. But as it was set in the Vietnam war, all of his characters were men. So, there was no evidence that he could write three dimensional women capable of self-sacrifice as well as greed, and other failings. But most of this book is told from a woman's perspective, and all of the women are memorable human beings with virtues and flaws.If you live in Oregon and Washington, you really must read this book. I was born on the East Coast, but lived in Washington for 20 years and now reside in Oregon. I learned so much about the early days here in the area around Astoria, Oregon and Chehalis, Washington. Although I an a retired executive from a forest products company frequently mentioned in this novel, I learned an amazing amount about the dangers of logging in the early days. I even learned about some massacres of union organizers that I was totally ignorant of....including one in Everett, Washington.If you are looking for a well-written novel with full-bodied characters that will make you cry...and maybe smile...while you learn about your country's history, you should buy this book.

If you want to know about old logging techniques this is the book for you. If you want a story where characters and story develop, it's not.Reading the acknowledgements at the end I noted that the author's wife was also his editor. This explains a lot. she should have taken a knife to the text instead of indulging. As other reviewers have noted events move from one thing to another but no one seems to progress. The heroine is inhuman yet every man falls in love with her: she proceeds to ruin their lives. I ended up hating her.The author mentions his debt to a Finnish epic poem but he mad his characters prototypes not people.

Lovely book. I enjoyed the author’s lyrical writing style and detailed descriptions enormously. As a resident of the Pacific Northwest i love to read books set in our beautiful region and this one didn’t disappoint. He uses some fictional names for places and i spent a couple of brain cells trying to figure out the real place names but he reveals all after the ending.

Brings unknown history of Finland and the early exploitation of ancient trees, poor immigrants and life in North West America to life. You feel for the fortunes of the central character Aino ...

Fantastic story about a time in history i knew little about. This book has everything. Puts things into perspective especially at the minute. Nice one karl this is fantastic book.

Love history so loved this. And loved that it was a good long read.