Crossing the River
Seven Stories That Saved My Life, A Memoir
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Everyone deals with grief in their own way. Helen MacDonald found solace in training a wild goshawk. Cheryl Strayed found comfort in hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. For Carol Smith, a Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist struggling with the sudden death of her seven-year-old son Christopher, the way to cross the river of sorrow was through work.
In Crossing the River, Smith recounts how she faced down her crippling loss through reporting a series of profiles of people coping with their own intense challenges, whether a freak accident, a debilitating injury, or a terrifying diagnosis. Smith deftly mixes the stories of these individuals and their families with her own account of how they helped her heal. General John Shalikashvili, once the most powerful member of the American military, taught Carol how to face fear with discipline and endurance. Seth, a young boy with a rare and incurable illness, shed light on the totality of her son's experiences, and in turn helps readers see that the value of a life is not measured in days.
This is a beautiful and profoundly moving book, an unforgettable journey through grief, and a valuable, illuminating read for anyone coping with loss.
Praise for Crossing the River
“...the stories she collected from that time inform this intimate and humane narrative that should offer solace for readers who have experienced similar circumstances...An uplifting group of moving stories.”
Kirkus
“a powerful, unforgettable memoir...told so compellingly that 15 pages in, no possibility of putting it down existed... Her writing never got in the way of a narrative but rather brought out its fullness... This book represents her triumph.... It’s magnificent.”
The Montana Standard
“This difficult yet hopeful reading journey will appeal to memoir fans and those interested in medical nonfiction.”
Booklist
“There is no rule book for how to grieve, so we are left to navigate our own way through it, hopeful that there are compasses in the world to point us in the right direction. Crossing the River is one such compass. An unflinching look at Carol Smith’s grief after the loss of her young son, it illuminates how sometimes going to the very places we want to hide from can show us the way.”
author of The Knitting Circle and Comfort: A Journey Through Grief
Carol Smith is an award-winning journalist and editor for NPR affiliate KUOW in Seattle. Previously she worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and the Los Angeles Times. Her newspaper work has won dozens of national and regional awards and has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize seven times, and her writing has appeared in more than a dozen literary journals. Smith was recently named Editor of the Year by Public Media Journalists Association.
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