Tue 9 Apr 2024
RICHARD BISSELL – High Water. Little Brown, hardcover, 1954. Signet 1230, paperback, 1955. Minnesota Historical Society Press, softcover, 1987.
Duke is first mate on a Mississippi tugboat. They’re hauling eight barges of coal upriver during a flood.
It’s a novel of riverboat adventure with lots of authentic sounding dialogue of rivermen talking about women and weather and why they ended up stuck on a riverboat on the Mississippi.
They rescue a good-looking woman from the roof of her house. Bad luck, say some. And then the fog rolls in, the steering breaks, and they hit a bridge. The boat starts to sink. And it’s every man (and woman) for themselves.
A convincing tale. Known for being the book that Elmore Leonard credited as teaching him how to write, along with Hemingway. But where Hemingway lacks a sense of humor, Bissell imbues his characters with jokes, tall tales, loud braggadocio, and quiet ironies. And it ends up sounding less like perfect prose and more like life.
I enjoyed it.
April 9th, 2024 at 10:21 pm
The author’s Wikipedia page is here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Pike_Bissell
One major claim to fame is in the first paragraph:
“Richard Pike Bissell (June 27, 1913 – May 4, 1977) was an American author of short stories and novels. His third book, and second novel, 7½ Cents, was adapted into the Broadway musical The Pajama Game. This won him (along with co-author George Abbott) the 1955 Tony Award for Best Musical.”
April 10th, 2024 at 8:57 am
He sounds like he lived a really interesting life.
April 11th, 2024 at 4:32 am
Tony, will ya fercrissakes quit doing this? I go straight from your excellent reviews to Abebooks, and the to-be-read shelf is now an overflowing bookcase.
And Steve, you’re not exactly blameless either.
April 11th, 2024 at 11:36 am
Double down on Tony’s reviews. He takes on little known books by writers I’ve never heard of (I lead a sheltered life), and makes me desperately want more time in the day to in order to read them.
April 11th, 2024 at 2:05 pm
I wish I had a middle name as brawny-sounding as ‘Pike’
April 13th, 2024 at 8:09 pm
Bissell was an interesting writer who covered a lot of territory. This one is an excellent adventure story of a type too seldom produced these days.