Northwest Passage

This book started my life-long fascination with American histor

This book started my life-long fascination with American history through the War of 1812. A great book!!!!. Read Arundel and Rabble in Arms, too.

It made me a reader.

I can't say this is the best book I ever read. But when I was a sixteen year old reading it at the rate of a hundred page per night, I'd have sworn it was the finest piece of literature ever produced by any writer in the Western World. I wish I could find a book that could produce in my adult mind the feelings and emotions Northwest Passage did at that time. This Kenneth Roberts' classic is both a quest-adventure and period-piece steeped with vivid details of a mostly ignored era in American history. Within the first couple of hundred pages you'll join an unforgettable array of tough characters known as Rogers' Rangers on a mission into the dark wilderness of lower Canada. You know right off that many of them won't be coming back...they have a death match awaiting them with a rogue band of the Abenaki Indians. It's a memorable episode. I've read Tolkien. I like Tolkien. But the details of Frodo's journey to Mordor seem as trivial as a shopping trip to Wal-Mart compared to the terror, hunger, and dissapointment the Rangers face on their oddysey through the untamed forests, swamps and mountains. The pace of the novel lags somewhat after the Canada expedition, but interest is held by the continuing story of the central character, Robert Rogers. His tale is a true American tragedy; a great hero undone by good intentions and treacherous friends. But there is still something inspiring about this backwoods warrior. Rogers as portrayed here, and in real life, never gave up. He is one of the most tenacious people you'll find in literature or history. There are faults I won't go into, and great moments I won't spoil. But I will add something that has to be said of any Kenneth Roberts book. They are are accurate. If (no matter how improbable it seems) he shows George Washington and Ghengis Khan sitting down for a taco-dinner in Miami, you can trust that it really happened. This was the perfect book for me to read when I was sixteen. I think it's still a great read for people of any age.

Following the master

Kenneth Roberts was the master historical novelist. The vibrant style and witty dialogue of Northwest Passage greatly influenced my own historical novel, Horse Dreamer. The characters in Northwest Passage -- especially Major Rogers -- are dynamic, and the action scenes -- especially the attack on the St. Francis Indians -- are unforgettable. This novel is literary art at its highest form.

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