🔹 River Love: The True Story of a Wayward Sheltie, a Woman, and a Magical Place Called Rivershire by Tricia Frey

Rating: 4 of 5 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
By: Kato Justus 

River Love: The True Story of a Wayward Sheltie, a Woman, and a Magical Place Called Rivershire by Tricia Frey is a beautiful, deeply personal memoir. This story is a well-written, direct, concise, and impressively honest account of a woman’s journey to self-acceptance after she meets a little lost dog. It’s also a story about her relationships with family, friends, and the beautiful strip of paradise she lives on, Rivershire. This book is a great summer read to savor. It is cathartic to other lost souls seeking redemption, happiness, peace-authentic self.

For animal lovers, this tender, authentic story will pull at your heartstrings in the same way “Old Yeller” does. Learning Sheldon, the Sheltie’s history of how he came to be in Rivershire will delight and relieve those who enjoy solving a mystery.

This story is particularly poignant for me because I grew up near Rivershire. It pulled every nostalgic heartstring I have. I know and deeply love the wild yet gentle, magical beauty that is northern Michigan. The breathtaking beauty of the land is an unspoiled, pristine secret. I know that wet, musky, sweet earthy smell of the river. That fragrance is heady and intoxicating, especially in the spring when everything comes alive with bursts of color or in the swelter of a verdant but humid long summer's day. I know the gorgeous but somehow sad flame of fall colors accompanied by the scent of wood-burning stoves. I know the brutal prick of winters cold to the eyes, nostrils—while seeing snow-devils blowing in the moonlight of a clear, starry night. This book brought all of that and so much more back to and alive for me.

As an ode to nature and relationships, the story is a spiritual journey of perseverance through adversity. It speaks of faith, patience, compassion, and love. It is a positive example of how to be fully present in a moment in the best way possible. This story gives the reader permission to grow and understand they are truly enough.

If you are searching for an uplifting, positive experience to savor, this is it. I recommend you pick up a copy of “River Love” by Tricia Frey. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, you will too (nostalgic sigh with a dreamy smile).