Across the Endless River
by Thad Carhart
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Pub Date Sep 01 2009 | Archive Date Sep 01 2012
Description
From the acclaimed bestselling author of The Piano Shop on the Left Bank comes a historical novel about Jean-Baptiste Charbonneau, the son of Sacagawea, and his intriguing sojourn as a young man in 1820's Europe
Born in 1805 on the Lewis & Clark expedition, Jean-Baptiste Charbonneau was the son of the expedition's translators, Sacagawea and Toussaint Charbonneau. Across The Endless River evokes the formative years of this mixed-blood child of the frontier, entering the wild and mysterious world of his boyhood along the Missouri. Baptiste is raised both as William Clark's ward in St. Louis and by his parents among the villages of the Mandan tribe on the far northern reaches of the river.
Please note this is the Canadian edition. For all US requests, please contact Knopf Doubleday.
In 1823, eighteen-year-old Baptiste is invited to cross the Atlantic with the young Duke Paul of Württemberg, whom he meets on the frontier. During their travels throughout Europe, Paul introduces Baptiste to a world he never imagined. Increasingly, Baptiste senses the limitations of life as an outsider; only Paul's older cousin, Princess Theresa, understands the richness of his heritage. Their affair is both passionate and tender, but Theresa's clear-eyed notions of love, marriage, and the need to fashion one's own future push Baptiste to consider what he truly needs.
In Paris, he meets Maura Hennesy, the beautiful and independent daughter of a French-Irish wine merchant. Baptiste describes his life on the fast-changing frontier to Maura, and she begins to imagine a different destiny with this enigmatic American. Baptiste ultimately faces a choice: whether to stay in Europe or to return to the wilds of North America. His decision will resonate strongly with those who today find themselves at the intersection of cultures, languages, and customs.
Advance Praise
"In this quirky and tender book about the rediscovery of Carhart's childhood passion for music lies a deeper meditation on the voluntary dreams of acceptance
by his chosen city." Rose Tremain
"Captivating... [Carhart] joins the tiny company of foreigners who have written of the French as verbs.... What he tries to capture is not the sight of them,
but what they see. The New York Times
"Thoroughly engaging... In part a book about that most unpredictable and pleasurable of human experiences, serendipity.... The book is also about something more difficult to pin down, friendship and community." The Washington Post
"Carhart writes with a sensuousness enhanced by patience and grounded by the humble acquisition of new insight into music, his childhood, and his relationship
to the city of Paris." The New Yorker
"A love affair with the piano... A minor classic." Times Literary Supplement (London)
"[Carhart's] writing is fluid and lovely enough to lure the rustiest plunker back to the piano bench and the most jaded traveler back to Paris." San Francisco Chronicle
"A captivating book, as desultory as an evening stroll, yet full of knowledge. It is suffused with Parisian sensations, the smell of fresh bread from the local bakery, water washing down the gutter in the morning.... You can read it in an evening, but when you close it you feel you have been on holiday." Sunday Times (London)
Available Editions
| EDITION | Paperback |
| ISBN | 9781552788233 |
| PRICE | 24.95 |
| PAGES | 320 |
