After journalist Jessica DuLong was laid off from her dot-com job, her life took an unexpected turn. A volunteer day aboard an antique fireboat, the John J. Harvey, led to a job in the engine room, where she found a taste of home she hadn’t realized she was missing. Working with the boat’s finely crafted machinery, on the waters of the storied Hudson, made her wonder what America is losing in our shift away from hands-on work. Her questions crystallized after she and her crew served at Ground Zero, where fireboats provided the only water available to fight blazes.
Vivid and immediate, My River Chronicles is a journey with an extraordinary guide—a mechanic’s daughter and Stanford graduate who bridges blue-collar and white-collar worlds, turning a phrase as deftly as she does a wrench. As she searches for the meaning of work in America, DuLong shares her own experiences of learning to navigate a traditionally male world, masterfully interweaving unforgettable present-day characters and events with four centuries of Hudson River history.
A celebration of craftsmanship, My River Chronicles is a deeply personal story of a unique woman’s discovery of her own roots—and America’s—that raises important questions about our nation’s future.
"An unexpected portrayal of America in the decline of industry, delivered from the unique vantage point of the Hudson River. . . . [A]n eye-opening picture of what America has been . . . and what it is becoming. . . . Powerful." - Kirkus, starred review
"Jessica DuLong’s elegantly written My River Chronicles brings the past of the Hudson River into the vivid present and carries forward the craft of literary non-fiction with grace and energy." - Gay Talese, author of A Writer’s Life and Unto the Sons
"She details her often exhilarating experiences in her very fine and gutsy book. Ms. DuLong is a confident and sensual writer, as perceptive about small matters on a boat as was Anthony Bourdain, in Kitchen Confidential, about everyday events in a professional kitchen. . . . Readers will feel their own little yelps of glee all over My River Chronicles." - The New York Times ArtsBeat blog
"The engine room is, in DuLong’s opinion, a tribute to an era of craftsmanship that is very nearly extinct." - The New Yorker
