<p>During the Great Depression, Lewis Seagrove struggles to provide for his wife and three children; an honest man, he will still do whatever necessary to take care of them. The stunning novel River Ice is about prejudice and survival. Lewis climbs onto a moving rail car carrying coal so he can throw some off, jumps from the train, and walks along the track to gather it. He takes a small row boat at night, making a treacherous trip across the 1,500-foot-wide Ohio River to pilfer vegetables from gardens on the Kentucky side. At the river, Lewis meets a young black kid squatting in an old river cabin. Sam is the son of a Mississippi sharecropper and the two develop a relationship. Lewis helps Sam get a job in his tenement building. Lewis' 12-year-old daughter, Dorothy, helps the family by taking a paper route. A customer, Todd Dreyson, is a child pornographer who Dorothy unwittingly becomes involved with, and her father finds out. Lewis confronts him and shortly after, Dreyson is murdered, a crime for which Lewis is charged. The aging district attorney wants a conviction to assure his re-election and doesn't let justice get in the way. </p><p><br></p><p>About the Author: David Martin lives near Raleigh, North Carolina with his wife, Desma, and is writing his next novel. Growing up in Cincinnati on the Ohio River provided the perfect backdrop for<em> River Ice</em>. </p>