Rating: 
Summary: New Age Mish Mash on Water
Review: My book club selected this, and I will admit it should generate lively discussion, if only because some of us will hate it, and some will like it. Personally, the new-agey spiritual narrative nauseated me. This lady whips out her personal altar at the drop of a hat; she is "stunned" by personal revelation to such an extent I wonder that emergency rooms around the lake weren't on high alert for her presence; she finds signs in things most normal people wouldn't even notice. While she writes about a spiritual journey,and personal transformation, ultimately, this is a story about a frustrated housewife who is figuring out how to get on with the rest of her life and needs a slew of new-age speak to get there.
Rating:
Summary: New Age Mish Mash on Water
Review: My book club selected this, and I will admit it should generate lively discussion, if only because some of us will hate it, and some will like it. Personally, the new-agey spiritual narrative nauseated me. This lady whips out her personal altar at the drop of a hat; she is "stunned" by personal revelation to such an extent I wonder that emergency rooms around the lake weren't on high alert for her presence; she finds signs in things most normal people wouldn't even notice. While she writes about a spiritual journey,and personal transformation, ultimately, this is a story about a frustrated housewife who is figuring out how to get on with the rest of her life and needs a slew of new-age speak to get there.
Rating: 
Summary: Intresting journey in spite of the whining.
Review: Quite a feat of endurance for this woman and her companion. Paddling around Lake Superior in 65 days in bad storms and cold tempratures would make anyone miserable. But Ms. Linnea chose to make the trip so I wondered where all the whinning and crying came from. The complaining got to the point where I almost put the book down but I too, seem to have endurance. As the trip approached the end, the complaints about the hardships changed into whining about being back in civilization. Will anything make this woman happy?? Still, the book holds some interest when she sticks to the topic of the actual trip. I have a great deal of respect for their kayaking ability and the ablity to read weather signs. This was no easy trip. I do wonder about the author when admits the trip left her with permanent physical damage - injured wrists and a damaged pancereas due to insufficient nutrition. What would make a person sacrifice future quality of life for one grand experience?
Rating: 
Summary: Zen and the art of kayaking....
Review: Sooner or later, we all face the prospect of losing a loved one. Often the death of a friend leads one to reflect on one's own mortality. Sometimes undertaking an arduous physical challenge helps alleviate the emotional pain following loss. Often the loss of someone dear leads to enormous changes in one's life.Ann Linnea lost a good friend to breast cancer. In a state of grief buried so deep she was not fully aware of it until she had completed a good part of her journey, she set out on an extraordinary trip kayaking around Lake Superior. She and her travel companion were subjected to incredible physical stress, and they experienced sublime beauty. By day, they paddled against the surf, in the rain and broiling sun, and through the treacherous debris of the coastline. Sometimes they paddled at night, where she saw "dark lichen-covered boulders..illuminated by a full moon." Like Pirsig in "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" Linnea alternately describes her evolving mental and emotional state and the intricacies of kayaking a long distance. "I wore heavy-soled hiking boots, teal wind pants, yellow waterproof parka"... she says. And a moment later, "The only other time in my life that I could remember feeling connected like this to the ancient spirit of a place was in 1988 on my second three-month camping trip to the desert southwest with my children." By the end of her book, Linnea has successfully circumnavigated Lake Superior, found the perfect place to scatter the ashes of her dead friend, and made some life-affirming decisions about her own existence.
Rating:
Summary: A Spiritual Awakening
Review: The day after her 43rd birthday Ann Linnea (and her brother-friend, Paul) begin circumnavigating Lake Superior by kayak, a 1200-mile spiritual and physical journey of 65 days. In order to complete this passage, and move onto the next phase of her life (which includes leaving her husband of 21 years), the author struggles to overcome physical and emotional limits while battling raging seas, bitter winds and freezing temperatures. Her desire to understand the changes she needs to make lead her on a search for life-affirming answers, and ultimately allow her to find purpose and meaning in her life. The insights she shares enable the reader to bear witness to her transformation as she faces self-doubt, life-threatening danger and exercises her choice to live. A marathon runner and cross country skier, Linnea is no stranger to the elements, no idle pursuer of physical challenges. Her life lessons are learned through her body. In the summer of 1992, Ann Linnea became the first woman to circumnavigate Lake Superior. Her experience with "She-Who-Is-The-Biggest" changed her life. The telling of that experience is both moving and meaningful.
Rating:
Summary: A Spiritual Awakening
Review: The day after her 43rd birthday Ann Linnea (and her brother-friend, Paul) begin circumnavigating Lake Superior by kayak, a 1200-mile spiritual and physical journey of 65 days. In order to complete this passage, and move onto the next phase of her life (which includes leaving her husband of 21 years), the author struggles to overcome physical and emotional limits while battling raging seas, bitter winds and freezing temperatures. Her desire to understand the changes she needs to make lead her on a search for life-affirming answers, and ultimately allow her to find purpose and meaning in her life. The insights she shares enable the reader to bear witness to her transformation as she faces self-doubt, life-threatening danger and exercises her choice to live. A marathon runner and cross country skier, Linnea is no stranger to the elements, no idle pursuer of physical challenges. Her life lessons are learned through her body. In the summer of 1992, Ann Linnea became the first woman to circumnavigate Lake Superior. Her experience with "She-Who-Is-The-Biggest" changed her life. The telling of that experience is both moving and meaningful.
Rating: 
Summary: Narcissism on the rocks.
Review: Thought this would be an introspective naturalist's commentary on kayaking in the wild of the Great Lakes. Sharing it with my women friends, they confirmed my judgement that the book is only one woman's whine about her self-absorption. Having help to pay for her needed therapy, I can only hope that the paper is recyclable. At least I didn't suffer a marriage to her as did one poor soul. Don't drown in this one.
Rating:
Summary: 227 pages of self pity.
Review: Warning: This is not a book about kayaking. This is a book about self pity and a woman whose personal life was screwed up. She writes page after page about how tired and cold she is. If she was so worried about being tired and cold why is she trying to circumnavigate Lake Superior? If you want a book written from a woman's perspective, buy "Baja By Canoe" by Valerie Fons instead.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting, worth-reading book. Shoulda' been better.
Review: What a setting for a story - a woman (and extraordinary athlete) circumnavigating Lake Superior in a kayak while dealing with a mid-life crisis! Too bad it's not as good as it could have been. Briefly, it is flawed by egocenticity, redundancy in the descriptions of predictable lake conditions, a dearth (well, at least not enough) of the natural wonders of the lake, a level of mysticism that invites scoffing, and lack of clarity of what created her resolutions. One might suspect two things: the trip was being made partly to provide the basis of a book, and she had mostly made up her mind about her crisis before she left - just needed time and an absence to screw up her courage. Sadly, part of the her mid-life crisis decision involved two bright children. I happen to think parenting is the single most important obligation we have in life. There was apparently no regard (at least not mentioned in the book) about what happens to the children of divorced parents. Especially a divorce from what appeared to be an educated, steady, professional, responsible and lenient guy most women would kill for. Apparently, the chidren's sake took second fiddle to the stifling "vanilla" of her husband. We can only hope her decisons made her happy.
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