Waterborne

by Bruce Murkoff

Book Overview

When Filius Poe sets out for Boulder City, the country is in the grips of the Great Depression, the Hoover administration in its final days. Filius, a young engineer from Wisconsin with a number of... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1400040388
• ISBN13: 9781400040384
• Release Date: February 2004
• Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf
• Length: 397 Pages
• Weight: 1.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 6.5" x 9.4"

Customer Reviews

Great story

Wonderful story of the building of Hoover Dam and the lives of three major characters. Framed by the hardship of the Great Depression, the plot grabs the reader, and will keep you bound to the last page.

Fabulous Writer

I agree entirely with the previous reviewers. There is so much in this book; beautifully written history of the depression era, characters who you really care about (or fear), all in a style that is so well developed is sounds a little like John Steinbeck. I really can't understand why the book was not a bestseller. I can only guess that this author is not well known amoung the NY literary intelligentsia. I am doing my best to tell everyone about it. Mr. Murkoff, please continue to write such wonderful material.

Where did this author come from?!

This is the first review that I have written. Bruce Murkoff is a writer of the first order. His evocation of turn-of-the-century America up to the Depression era ia astounding. Best fiction I have found in over a year. Abosultely, stunningly good. Writes like someone who has lived rather than someone who wants to be a writer....I only wish I had been so inspired on visit to the Hoover dam in 1980! ;>) Watch this book and author begin to gain critical acclaim. But that's not what's important, Mr. Murkoff has come out of nowhere and is better (way better) than authors who fill pages with junk. This is a talent of the first order.

Top shelf - outstanding

Waterborne is a gritty, sexy tale of three people looking for redemption and fulfillment in a new life. Mr Murkoff does an excellent job of creating characters we can love, hate, empathize with, but never be indifferent about. What a talent!The raging Colorado River and the construction of the Hoover Dam is an ever present metaphor throughout the story. Ingenious storytelling!Once I started this book I didn't want to put it down but then nearing the end I didn't want the book to end.

Three streams converge....

In the same way that three streams begin in different places and converge to become a river, so too do the characters Filius, Lena, and Lew start in Wisconsin, Oklahoma, and New York, each heading to the construction town of Boulder City, Nevada. In the tradition of John Dos Passos (U.S.A. Trilogy), Murkoff tells one character's story, then breaks at the perfect moment to take up another character's story. This is compelling reading!