Synopsis
The Run to Gitche Gumee is pure Jones: an outrageous outdoor adventure heightened by ribald humor, violence, sex, pitch-perfect dialog, unforgettably eccentric characters, and a riveting plot.Part One opens as two boyhood friends on the cusp of manhood - Ben, who is about to go off to the Korean War, and Harry, who is college-bound to become a doctor - set off on the final adventure of their youth: a canoe trip down the Firesteel River to Lake Superior, also known as Gitche Gumee, or the Big-Sea-Water by the native Ojibwa. Armed with flyrods and shotguns, they plan to fish and hunt their way downriver, relishing their last blast of freedom in the great outdoors. But their idyllic ride becomes surrealistic - as unexpected encounters with millionaires, college girls, hipsters, and lunatics are by turns titillating, nerve-wracking and deadly.Part Two takes place fifty years later, when Ben and Harry, now confronting illness and marital strife, decide to recreate their canoe trip as a last hurrah. This time the bravado of youth is replaced with the wisdom of their years and the pains of their pasts. This time they have little left to lose. (5 3/4 x 8 1/2, 292 pages)
New York Times
The reader should never lose sight of the fact that he's in the company of an uncommonly gifted writer.