Where the River Ends

Aug 6, 2025 3:29 PM

Author:Charles Martin

'Nobody fights forever, so I prepared myself for two battles. The first was fighting alongside her.We've done that.As well as two can.But, as the years have ticked by, I've seen a second front coming - and it's the tougher of the two. Abbie might still be swinging but she was beat. To be honest, I think she was still in the ring fighting, simply for me. Lately, the thing that had been keeping me up nights was wondering what would happen if I told her that she could let her guard down - that she could stop fighting. What if she was just waiting on me?'

Chris Michaels and Abbie Colman should never have met let alone fallen in love. As the only child of South Carolina's most senior senator, Abbie's father had wanted better for her than Chris, who grew up in a trailer park next to the St Mary's river. Abbie and Chris had married quickly and secretly, returning to face her parents' objections that haven't faded even after over fourteen years of marriage.

But now Abbie and Chris are coming to the end of the road. Diagnosed with breast cancer four years before, Abbie's case is now terminal and they've run out of options. Rather than letting Abbie spend her final days in a cold, sterile hospital room, Chris packs their bags and steals away with her in the middle of the night.

They carry with them Abbie's 'wish list' - ten things she wants to do before she dies. The wishes are simple, normal; because after four years of non-stop invasive medical treatments, 'normal' is a fleeting memory. Along with taking a final trip with Chris on the river that holds so many memories for them both, Abbie wants to dance with her husband, drink wine on a beach, laugh until it hurts. But as they head for river's end, racing against weather and time, Abbie's father, the press and the police are determined to find them and bring Abbie home...

Reviews

Have plenty of tissues and waterproof mascara to hand this is a great big, beautiful weepie. Wonderfully written, heartbreaking and hopeful. I couldn't put it down.

—— Carole Matthews

A powerful love story

—— OK Magazine

Touching novel...must-read book...Hankies ready!

—— Bella

In the tradition of Nicholas Sparks & Robert James Waller, Martin has fashioned a heartbreaking story

—— Publishers Weekly

An intelligent, bittersweet debut novel

—— Sunday Times

Nguyen is an amusing observer of assimilation angst...this gentle-comedy of inter-generational strife is a polished and poised affair

—— Independent

Fonseca's prose is fluent, confident and often funny ... she has a gift for satire that glimmers through this novel. And a near-perfect ear for nuances of speech. Attachment is ferociously well observed. Both physiologically and socially ... as a first novel, the signs of greater things are clearly there

—— Guardian

Fonseca's voice - poised, particular, exotic - rises above her plot

—— Observer

Her prose is elegant and wry

—— Daily Telegraph

Fonseca's talent lies in describing the texture of daily life: the mango with a 'skin like sunset', the pizza boxes that open 'like laptops' ... she is good on the sweep of history and the cultural climate of previous times ... telling details of character - particularly the male characters, are captured well

—— New Statesman

Isabel Fonseca's slinkily assured debut novel shows a wry appreciation of the complexities of modern love...a novel that presumes to put a woman's mid-life crisis - sexual, spiritual and intellectual - centre stage

—— Emma Hagestadt , Independent

Involving novel

—— Observer

this smart, clammy drama, manages to be both unsettling and touching

—— Guardian

Fabulous and very clever

—— Marilla Frostrup , Psychologies

A witty exploration of the preoccupations of middle age - sex, serious illness, the death of a parent - its main attraction being the voice, at once tough, funny and lonely, of the inimitable Jean.

—— Arminta Wallace , Irish Times

Fonesca's debut novel is a funny, heart rendering account of the virtues of love and desire, confounded against the everyday.

—— www.harpersbazaar.co.uk

Beautifully written

—— Image Magazine

It is expertly written in its way, and oddly compelling - like a slushy movie you can't help but respond to

—— Guardian

Moving and thoughtful ... Poignant and compelling, this lyrical novel lifts the veil on an internal world of love, rivalry and misunderstanding; an intricate depiction of sibling relationships

—— Good Book Guide

A beautifully evocative and intelligent novel

—— Woman & Home

This impassioned tale is a gripping read

—— James Smart , The Guardian

Jones is fabulous...offering titbits of danger and discord, yet keeping a cool matter-of-fact tone for the big horrors

—— Sunday Times

Her second novel is a must-read; a devastating, brilliant account of what happens when everything a man believes in...begins to crumble

—— Cath Kidson Magazine

Full of danger and discord

—— Sunday Times Summer Reading

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