Ten Mile River : Is America broken?
Ten Mile River is a novel written by Paul Griffin, who portrays America in a different light to what we see in movies and television shows.
‘Homeless Group with Dog’ by Franco Folini
Homeless people are a prevalent fact in America, but Jose and Raymond are different. They choose to be homeless because they can. They go through what no teenage boy should go through, killing dogs, stealing, moving bodies, falling in frozen rivers and getting arrested.
“Yo Ray! Let’s get us that Lincoln then I can get my bike!” is some of the unusual American colloquialism used by Raymond and Jose, in their strange yet amusing lives.
Ten Mile River is an interesting book that breaks some of the teen-writing barriers, such as dead bodies and murder. Griffin portrays Jose as tough and strong, the leader and strength of the two. He portrays Raymond as intelligent, lost in a world that isn’t his, wanting the freedom to do whatever he wants to be intelligent.
Reading the blurb makes you think of a classic river story of young boys, Huckleberry Finn. Although there is only that one similarity between the two, I believe that it was written as a comparitive study for Huckleberry Finn, as the original publishing of 1884 is too long ago for a sequel to be written.
This book is good at most points, but it just gets under your skin in others so that you don’t want to read it anymore, yet sometimes you get sad when you must put it down to go do another menial task. Overall, this is an interesting novel to read because it stirs your emotions, gives an insight into American Life and shows how misguided troubled youths can be.
I Strongly recommend this book to avid readers, but if you struggle with reading a whole book, The American slang and troubling events will make it hard for you to not finish it.
Rated: 8.5/10
November 4th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Great journalistic take on this book, Daniel. I would not have thought to match it with Huckleberry Finn, but you have made me think about this. It reminds me of John Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men”. The pairing of two characters who each have strengths and weaknesses, and who are held together by a strong sense of friendship and loyalty is there in both.
You are a bit hard on Jose and Ray. You say they have chosen to be homeless. I think that they would say they have chosen to stay together, and that this represents home for them. The author does not tell us much about the time before the story starts, but considering both boys are only 14 I imagined that the homes they came from must have been pretty difficult.