The River Queen

In fall 2005 travel writer Mary Morris set off down the Mississippi in a battered old houseboat called the River Queen, with two river rats named Tom and Jerry--and a dog who hated her. It was a time of emotional turmoil for Morris: her father had just died; her daughter was leaving home; life was changing all around her. So she decided to return to the Midwest where she was from, to the river she remembered. Morris describes living like a pirate and surviving a tornado. Because of Katrina, oil prices, and drought, the river was often empty--a ghost river. As she learned to pilot her boat and…