Across the Endless River

Across the Endless River by Thad Carhart

Speaking of adventure, this novel tells the story of Jean-Baptiste Charbonneau, the real life son of Sacagawea, translator for Lewis and Clark on the Voyage of Discovery.  Jean-Baptiste, affectionately called Pompey, was born on the trail and spent his young years dividing his time between  the Indian village of his parents (his father was the French Voyageur Toussaint Charbonneau, also a translator on the Voyage) and St Louis under the guardianship of William Clark who mentored and educated him.  Leading this double life, made him the perfect host for the young German Duke, Paul of Wuerttemberg, an adventurer and collector of Indian and frontier paraphernalia.  He invites Jean-Baptiste to return to Europe to help him display, catalogue  and explain the significance of his collection to Europeans who were enthralled with Native cultures at the time.  This adventure lasted 6 years and introduced him to a world both extremely foreign and yet strangely familiar.