The River by Gary Paulsen

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The River
by Gary Paulsen
(Audio)

I picked this up out of my friend's Little Free Library. I thought I'd read Hatchet as a kid, but I was definitely wrong. I earread that one before starting this one, and I was glad both are read by the same reader; I liked having the same voice in my head for the character.

In this story, a government psychologist wants to go with Brian to a different island in order to study the way he survives--not just the techniques, but how his mental abilities helped him survived. Brian has a unique way of looking at the wilderness, shown through examples like how he thinks things like "this is too easy; what am I missing?" or "this is the way an animal might do this; this is the way animals survive" etc. He tried to explain how he "discovered" fire to someone in the "real world," but she didn't understand it. This psychologist guy, Derek, wants to understand so that they can teach Brian's way of thinking and problem-solving to people who might find themselves in survival situations.

Brian has had pretty much no "field" experience. And Brian insists they do it without supplies like food or medicine or shelter equipment. That makes it more real, certainly, and gives Derek a lot of material to work with (though, for a while, Brian is unable to explain what's going on in his mind, unable to show how he makes his deductions or understandings).

The back cover told me something happened to Derek, but I accidentally put in disc 1 at first instead of disc 3 and Derek seemed all right from the first few lines of that. So I didn't know what to expect as I read. What happened, and when it happened, surprised me. Yes, there were still lots of moments where I wanted to say "oh, come ON, Paulsen. Does the kid really need THAT right now on top of the rest?" But, in the end, it all turned out to make a good book.

I enjoyed seeing Brian surviving in the wilderness again. I enjoyed another adventure with him. I thought it was a little forced at times and, at other times, a little absurdly complicated. There is a fine line with storytelling between drama and annoyance. And I'm not sure it works well for me in Paulsen's writing all the time. But I am still looking forward to the next book about Brian.