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Time Is a River | 
 enlarge | Author: Mary Alice Monroe
Publisher: Pocket
Category: Book
List Price: $25.00
Buy New: $9.78
You Save: $15.22 (61%)
New (41) Used (20) Collectible (2) from $6.50
Rating:  114 reviews
Sales Rank: 46632
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 384
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.5
ISBN: 1416544364
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9781416544364
ASIN: 1416544364
Publication Date: July 8, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
With a strong, warm voice that brings the South to life, New York Times bestselling author Mary Alice Monroe writes richly textured stories that intimately portray the complex and emotional relationships we share with families, friends, and the natural world. "Every book that Mary Alice Monroe has written has felt like a homecoming to me," writes Pat Conroy, bestselling author of The Prince of Tides.Time Is a River is an insightful novel that will sweep readers away to the seductive southern landscape, joining books by authors such as Anne Rivers Siddons and Sue Monk Kidd. Recovering from breast cancer and reeling from her husband's infidelity, Mia Landan flees her Charleston home to heal in the mountains near Asheville, North Carolina. She seeks refuge in a neglected fishing cabin belonging to her fly-fishing instructor, Belle Carson. Belle recently inherited the cabin, which once belonged to a grandmother she never knew -- the legendary fly fisher and journalist of the 1920s, Kate Watkins, whose life fell into ruins after she was accused of murdering her lover. Her fortune lost in the stock market crash and her reputation destroyed, Kate slipped into seclusion in the remote cabin. After her death the fishing cabin remained locked and abandoned for decades. Little does Belle know that by opening the cabin doors to Mia for a summer's sanctuary, she will open again the scandal that plagued Belle's family for generations. From her first step inside the dusty cabin, Mia is fascinated by the traces of Kate's mysterious story left behind in the eccentric furnishings of the cabin. And though Belle, ashamed of the tabloid scandal that tortured her mother, warns Mia not to stir the mud, Mia is compelled to find out more about Kate...especially when she discovers Kate's journal. The inspiring words of the remarkable woman echo across the years. Mia has been learning to fly-fish, and Kate's wise words comparing life to a river resonate deeply. She begins a quest to uncover the truth behind the lies. As she searches newspaper archives and listens to the colorful memories of the local small-town residents, the story of a proud, fiercely independent woman emerges. Mia feels a strange kinship with the woman who, like her, suffered fears, betrayal, the death of loved ones, and a fall from grace -- yet found strength, compassion and, ultimately, forgiveness in her isolation. A story timeless in its appeal emerges, with a power that reopens old wounds, but also brings a transforming healing for Mia, for Kate's descendants, and for all those in Mia's new community.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 109 more reviews...
 Simply marvelous! January 6, 2009
S. Stinson (Oklahoma USA)
Time Is A River by Mary Alice Monroe is simply marvelous. Mia is a cancer survivor gone away on a retreat with other survivors. She leaves early and returns home only to find her husband in bed with another woman! Devastated, Mia decides to go back to the retreat and finds that fly fisherwoman, Belle Carson has on old cabin, high on a mountain with no phones, no TV or radio, that she offers to Mia.
Mia accepts, yet has a hard time with all the pain of chemo, cancer and the biggest betrayal of her husband. While there, Mia learns the story of the cabin's original owner, Kate Watkins, Belle's grandmother, who allegedly murdered her lover. As a welcome distraction to her own pain, Mia decides to find out the truth through Kate's newly discovered journals, even though Belle warns her to leave things alone.
Throughout the summer, we watch as Mia becomes the woman all of us would like to be: rediscovering the wonders of life, the thrill of fly fishing and making herself whole again, all the while uncovering Kate's secret. Time Is a River is a wonderful journey of mystery, love, and healing. You shouldn't miss one!
Heartwarming and Good December 31, 2008
Danielle Lane (Horseshoe, North Carolina)
Cancer surviver Mia Landon can't wait to get home to Charleston to tell her husband of the wonderful time she had learning to fly fish with other cancer survivors, but when she gets there, bursting to tell him how happy she feels, she finds him in bed with a beautiful, younger woman, who by the way, does not have cancer and has not had her body mutilated.
Mia can't get out of there fast enough and she heads back to where she'd come from, back to Belle Carson, the woman who runs the group Casting for Recovery. Belle offers Mia the use of a mountain cabin she'd inherited from her grandmother for the summer. The cabin held only bad memories for Belle's mother and Belle wants nothing to do with it or anything that has to do with her grandmother, a famous fly fisherwoman and journalist named Kate Watkins.
While staying there Mia finds Kate's journals and her fly fishing rods and through fly fishing and learning Kate's story, which includes a rumor that she killed her lover in the very cabin Mia is staying in, she begins to heal, both from her depression over her cancer and her husband's betrayal. Speaking of him, the dirty rat keeps calling Mia, wanting to be civil. Grrrr, I hate men like that, but I loved Mia and I loved this story. It's heartwarming and good, but be sure to keep some Kleenex nearby, because guaranteed you'll be shedding some tears.
Wonderful growth and empowerment novel, with a mystery buried within December 27, 2008
Alan Mills (Chicago, Illinois USA)
Time Is A River begins with Mia falling apart, having caught her husband in an affair, just as she survived a battle with breast cancer. She holes up in a friend's cabin in the North Carolina mountains, while she finds herself.
As the novel progresses, her character develops on the pages--just as Mia finds her own self--through fly fishing.
While this part of the novel would stand on its own, it is made far more powerful by burying within a murder mystery--which Mia unravels by piecing together the accused's story--in parallel to her attempts to piece together her own identity.
By intertwining the two different stories, Munroe makes both much stronger. This is a great read, and highly recommended.
 Escapist entertainment December 27, 2008
Jay J. Smith (Tallahassee, FL)
I began "Time Is a River" with heightened expectations, for a few reasons. First, the story allowed me to reconnect with my roots, having grown up with a second home that was a real-McCoy log cabin in the mountains. Being a refelctive guy, I looked forward to reading about Mia's time of reflection and healing in a cabin alone. And I also wanted to learn about fly-fishing.
Monroe's descriptions of the mountains, of fly-fishing, and of nature delivered the goods; I savored them. However, her treatment of deep soul work involved in healing seemed simplistic and contrived and far less messy than I've experienced. Three months seems like too scant a time to recover from substantial setbacks: first, breast cancer, then her husband's infidelity. Her reovery moved too swiftly for me. Her healing in the mountains, aided by fly-fishing, deserved weightier, more probing treatment.
I also regret to say that the characters struck me as flat and predictable, fleshing out a story that relies too heavily on contrivances. At no point was I unable to anticipate the outcome of an interaction or challenge.
However, those who enjoy light drama, light romance and light treatment will enjoy this book. It tells a story of resillience and hope. Also, Monroe's writing succeeds nicely, occasionally offering a glimpse of precision and poetry. The ideas and emotions powering this story hint at wise understanding.
Often I wondered what this book would look like if she had written it twenty years later in life. I have a hunch its heft would increase, its pace slow and deepen, and its tendency to tell the reader what to think would diminish. In essence, the story holds potential for greater resonance and weight, achieved through the strength of particulars and concrete detail.
Saved by. . . .a guy (sigh!) December 23, 2008
J. Marren (Glen Ridge, NJ USA)
"Time is a River" will be eagerly devoured by Mary Alice Monroe fans, but for me, it was just a diversion. I like to learn about "stuff" when I read, and the author delivers in that department. Mia Landan goes on a retreat for breast cancer survivors, and learns the mysterious art of fly-fishing. Monroe's descriptions of the equipment, the flies and casting were vivid and intriguing. She managed to convey an almost hypnotic, meditative quality to the sport that I liked a lot.
But the rest was pretty standard stuff. Husband can't deal with wife's cancer, behaves very badly, woman retreats to regain self-esteem, is suitably annoyed when a guy appears on the scene--but then of course, he turns out to be a prince, and she falls in love. In the meantime, she solves a decades-old town mystery, and saves Belle, the woman who first saved her by teaching her how to fly fish, from anger and bitterness. Mia leaves to get her life organized, a new self-confident woman, but is there any doubt she'll be back?
Maybe books about women on their own don't sell. Maybe the market demands the romantic story line. If only life always worked out like this! But it doesn't . . . .this novel is acceptable escapist fare, but not much more.
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