The Riverkeeper

Reveals the lives of Portuguese-American fishermen of Provincetown, Massachusetts, the Tlingit Indians of Admiralty Island in Alaska, and John Cronin's work in protecting the Hudson River

In these leisurely essays, Wilkinson ( Big Sugar ) writes about persons who earn their living on the water. The "riverkeeper" of the title is John Cronin, who patrols the Hudson River, tracking down polluters (his most notorious catch was the Exxon Corporation). Another piece examines the customs of Portuguese fishermen in Provincetown, Mass. The longest essay is devoted to the Tlingit Indians of Angoon, on Alaska's Admiralty Island: under U.S. government rule since 1882, when the American navy bombarded their tiny village, they have nonetheless determined to preserve their traditional way of life. Wilkinson's choppy prose style and his tendency to linger on insignificant details can be annoying, yet those curious about little-known aspects of American culture will find much of interest here.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In three portraits, two reprinted from The New Yorker, Wilkinson (Big Sugar, 1989; Moonshine, 1985, etc.) examines the lives of people who earn their living on the water. ``The Blessing of the Fleet'' finds Wilkinson traveling to Provincetown, where for generations Portuguese-Americans have fished the waters off Cape Cod. In ``The Riverkeeper,'' he follows John Cronin, ``the only person in America to list `riverkeeper' on his tax form,'' as he patrols the Hudson. The third portrait, ``The Uncommitted Crime,'' delves into the lives of the Tlingit Indians of Admiralty Island (Alaska), whose culture has been almost completely destroyed by US rule. All three pieces are strong, quietly drawn portraits that derive much of their power from the accumulation of carefully selected facts, some of which are mind- bogglingly strange: Parts of the Hudson River floor, Wilkinson writes, are paved a foot-deep with beer bottles. Wilkinson is a meticulous and thoughtful stylist, capable of grand poetic moments (``All the clouds were swept to the edges of the horizon, as if the sky were a great big dance floor, and you could see the details on the hills and a woman at a window in one of the houses watching us go by''). And he manages to pull the first two portraits together to satisfying resolutions, although ``The Uncommitted Crime,'' while more unusual in subject matter and more ambitious in scope, doesn't work quite as well. Occasionally slow-moving and elusive, it fails to give a solid sense of what modern-day Tlingit life is like. Overall, skillfully wrought, evocative insights into little- known arenas of American life. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Wilkinson has established himself as one of our most acute chroniclers of those who have slipped through the cracks of modern society. In his last three books he has moved from moonshiners and those who pursue them ( Moonshine , LJ 8/85) to Florida sugar cane laborers ( Big Sugar , LJ 9/1/89) to this work on people who draw their livelihoods from the water. In three vignettes, he portrays Portuguese-American fishermen off Cape Cod, a "riverkeeper" who patrols the Hudson, and the Tlingit Indians of Alaska. Clear of ear and sharp of eye, Wilkinson describes their lives with literate simplicity and, while he abandons the muckraking of Big Sugar , some familiar devil figures (Exxon and the 19th-century white man) do not emerge unscathed. Recommended for public library collections.
-Jim Burns, Pompano Beach City Lib., Fla.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.