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| Snow Mountain Passage | 
| Author: James D. Houston
Publisher: Harvest Books
Category: Book
List Price: $14.00
Buy Used: $0.01
You Save: $13.99 (100%)
New (37) Collectible (3) from $0.82
Avg. Customer Rating:  29 reviews
Sales Rank: 271403
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 336
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5.6 x 1
ISBN: 0156011433
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780156011433
ASIN: 0156011433
Publication Date: April 24, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
| Showing reviews 1-5 of 29 | | NEXT » |
 A moving, vivid tale... January 26, 2008
This is a beautiful, beautiful book, brimming with emotion and rooted in the majesty and danger of nature. Although the cover proclaims Snow Mountain Passage to be "a novel of the Donner party," that does not reflect the spirit and depth of this work.
Those of us who have heard of the Donner Party probably have a generic picture of stranded, desperate pioneers, some of whom get stranded in the mountains in the winter of 1846-7 and turn to cannibalism to survive. It's a famous story, and knowing that much isn't a spoiler in terms of reading this book. (You can get the basic Donner Party story by looking it up in Wikipedia.)
But surely there is a more subtle reality -- the Donner Party was made up of real people, real families, forced apart by circumstance, trying to find each other again, trying to make a place for themselves in California or at least to survive long enough to get there. James D. Houston uses the known facts as a framework upon which he thoughtfully builds the imagined lives of the Reeds, one of the families caught up in the mountains that winter.
Only part of the story takes place with the stranded party members. Much of it centers around Jim Reed, who becomes separated from the Donner Party, forced to leave his wife and children behind. He makes it to the west coast, but all he wants is to find a way back through the snow, into the mountains, to rescue his family.
Reading Snow Mountain Passage, it's easy to feel the connection the author feels to the people, the history, the place. Houston takes his time creating a picture of the political and social turmoil of the 1840s West. Mexicans, Native Americans, Californians and new immigrants from the States all struggled to define their place in a changing world of shifting power and alliances. Sometimes I felt as though a better grasp of California history would have served me well as I read this book, and every so often I wished the passages in which characters debated about which side to take were a bit shorter.
Still, none of this took away from the power of the central story, and the breathtaking ability of Houston's prose to make it come alive. This one is a real gem. I hope you won't miss it.
 Mixed feelings July 16, 2007
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I admit to being a bit disappointed, as this book turned out to be more about Jim Reed and less about the Donner party. The first part of the book was very entertaining as it dealt with the Donner/Reed group on the trail to California. A disagreement arises between Reed and another leading to a fight and Reed has to leave the wagon train and strike out on his own towards California on horse ahead of the others. Once the wagon train reaches Truckee and snow hits and they realize they can go no further, the story leaves them and the middle third of the book is about Reed's travels on the other side of the Sierras. I found this part to be quite boring and I was literally skimming and skipping chapters. I just wasn't interested (nor expecting) to read about the US/Mexican war in California nor Reed's involvement with same.
Interspered with the author's writings of Reed's story are Notes from the Trail by his daughter Patty that were written when Patty was much older. Those were the chapters that held my interest, especially the story of the rescue and getting the survivors out of their winter camp and over the mountains to safety.
All in all a reasonably interesting read, but I'm glad I got it from the library as it's one I'm not likely to want to read again. Four stars for Patty's Notes from the Trail, two stars for the story of Jim Reed and the US/Mexican war.
One of the finest books ever written about the West May 13, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is simply an awesome display of storytelling, combining historical "fiction" with non-fiction (the latter derived from the actual notes and writings of a real survivor of the incident), and illustrating the incredible power of James D. Houston's mind and writing talent!
If you want to actually imagine and feel and understand what it was like, to cross the western half of this country in an immigrant wagon train, including experiencing the vast power of winter in the California Sierra, then read this book! It is much more historical fact than historical fiction, but beyond this, it is highly "real", and says more about the discovery of the American West than any other book I've ever read (and I've read a lot about this topic).
 Snow Mountain Passage January 6, 2007
Excellent book centered around the recollections of one of the Donner Party. Author did a terrific job of integrating the actual events with the very lucid memoirs of one of the Reed daughters.
Very good read! November 3, 2006
The book starts out in Santa Cruz California with Patty Reed recalling her memoies of the "Ordeal by Hunger" (another book) Many times I had to remind myself that Patty herself did not write the words I was reading - it is so good. If you like Historical novels or if you are from the Bay Area (or both) this book is for you. Fast read. I couldn't put it down.
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