Book Review of Bridges...

BRIDGES

A local restaurant in my home town has pictures on the wall from when the tobacco industry first came to Florida. I look at these pictures and wonder what life was like in those days. I walked into a shop a couple of months ago to drop off two treadmill motors for repair. On the walls, they had pictures from when they first opened shop, which was in the 40's. There were women in dresses and men with nice shirts repairing small motors on their benches. When they took us to the back the scene was completely different from what I saw in the pictures in the front office.

 I told my friend who was with me, "Boy, what a difference from the pictures on the wall." He laughed and said it was another era. That statement made me think even more about the people in those pictures.

If you're anything like me your curiosity takes the best of you, but you don't have any real idea what it was like. Bridges will close that gap providing a historical view into the past and mixes it with fiction to take you away to that other era. I visited Niagara Falls when I was a young man. No, I don't want to mention what year that was. Suffice it to say it was many years ago. I pulled out those old pictures and looked at them feeling the same wonder. I've never seen it in the winter time, after reading this book I would like to go see the ice.

Now all though I've visited Niagara, I have never heard of the old hermit. I have not heard of the story when people used to walk on the frozen falls called the ice bridge. If you're like me, you'll want to hear about the gorge and its incredible frightening beauty. With delicate details LeVick describes the deadly whirlpool. You'll feel as if you're at the falls as the cold winds punish you, and the currents rumble under your feet.

In this adventurous book, you will learn the connection between Niagara Falls and bootleggers. LeVick does a wonderful job of connecting the past with the current through an emotional depiction of events. Like the Underground Railroad, and the massacre of English soldiers by the Iroquois braves.

However, the action, the real adventure takes place when five young men decide to experience Niagara Falls for themselves. After seeing the pictures on the wall of Ol' Gordy's general store, they agree it's their turn to see it first hand. It doesn't matter that it's dangerous, or that it's even against the law they need to do this. At first they are exposed to the wonder and majesty of the falls. Then the colorful demons, curses, and dangers come out to greet them. Now they must face the reality of their worst fears come to life.