The River Between Us

By: Richard Peck, 164 pp.

"People swarmed wherever you looked. Men mainly, of every age. Most were in uniform or parts of uniform. Some went about their business, but more of them were drunk - reeling drunk and fighting drunk and sleeping it off with their boots in the ditches and their heads cradled in filth."

This is the scene that Richard Peck describes how the Civil War was in Cairo, Illinois; and these were the men who were not killed or very ill or hurt from the war, just drunk. The scenes are worse and sickening as Peck reveals the sick and the hurt of the war.

This starred review book is one of our Big Read books in April.

Peck first takes you through a trip with Howard Hutchings in 1916 on his way to his grandmother's house. Then Howard's grandmother, Tilly Pruitt, tells Howard how she lived through the Civil War back in 1861 and travels form her home in Grand Tower, Illinois to Cairo, Illinois to retrieve her twin brother, Noah, from the war.

From this trip, Howard learns of his family's secret.