The River of Kings (2018) by Taylor Brown

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

The River of Kings (2018)

by Taylor Brown

Altamaha River, Georgia

Georgia: 25/25

  I missed The River of Kings my first time through Georgia- so make this novel 25/25 for that state. The River of Kings is interesting and kind of a mess as well- a head scratching combination of settler-fiction with a contemporary tale of two brothers searching for the truth behind their father's untimely death at the hands of a sturgeon on the river.  For the life of me I couldn't figure out the thematic connection between the two tales- besides the shared geography of the river.   The settler tale was of the moder variety, where the western "conquest" of the new world is shown to be much more precarious than history would have it.  The inevitability that constitutes the modern world view would have been a shock to the French settlers of the 16th century who figure in The River of Kings.

  Meanwhile the modern tale of two brothers- one a college student, the other a damaged veteran of the war in Afghanistan, never really sparked to life. Perhaps because they don't do anything except try to figure out their dad's death over a couple of days "on the river."  Author Taylor Brown did a decent job capturing the sophistication of the Native Americans- as we now know, the early European settlers were incorporated into the existing political-military landscape and were far from being the dominant player for hundreds of years.