Where the Water Goes

Life and Death Along the Colorado River

By: David Owen

Narrated by: Fred Sanders

“Wonderfully written…Mr. Owen writes about water, but in these polarized times the lessons he shares spill into other arenas. The world of water rights and wrongs along the Colorado River offers hope for other problems.” —Wall Street Journal

An eye-opening account of where our water comes from and where it all goes.

The Colorado River is an essential resource for a surprisingly large part of the United States, and every gallon that flows down it is owned or claimed by someone. David Owen traces all that water from the Colorado’s headwaters to its parched terminus, once a verdant wetland but now a million-acre desert. He takes readers on an adventure downriver, along a labyrinth of waterways, reservoirs, power plants, farms, fracking sites, ghost towns, and RV parks, to the spot near the U.S.–Mexico border where the river runs dry.

Water problems in the western United States can seem tantalizingly easy to solve: just turn off the fountains at the Bellagio, stop selling hay to China, ban golf, cut down the almond trees, and kill all the lawyers. But a closer look reveals a vast man-made ecosystem that is far more complex and more interesting than the headlines let on.

The story Owen tells in Where the Water Goes is crucial to our future: how a patchwork of engineering marvels, byzantine legal agreements, aging infrastructure, and neighborly cooperation enables life to flourish in the desert—and the disastrous consequences we face when any part of this tenuous system fails.

Big picture of the river and its challenges

Well-written and interesting account of the incredibly complex issues surrounding the Colorado river and the states that depend on it. I see now why entire books have been written about water politics in the West. Owen’s book is more of an overview, with vivid visual details, interviews with experts, and broad strokes covering the environmental, economic, legal, and political issues. I got the information I needed to be a better user and witness of the Colorado River.

Informative

Great book. Very informative and I felt non biased. Really eye opening and thought provoking. The narrator was a little dry and could sound robotic at times but did not deter me from listening to this book.

Easy Read on a tough topic

I wish the map would of been displayed on the audio book along with the chapter titles.

Western Water - A Must Listen

David Owen has written a very informative and entertaining book on water in the western USA; the confusing and often contradictory laws of water rights, evolution of the culture surrounding water and the serious predicament we are in. One may think this is likely to be a dry [sic], boring text, and you would be wrong.

Great overview of the problems facing the river.

The author does a good job balancing the pros and cons of water use and mitigation along the Colorado River while staying impartial. This is a good snapshot of the basics along the river while quoting more in depth articles and research.

The narration was okay with the narrator pronouncing Spanish words quite well, but then said "salt-on" during the chapter on the Salton Sea. The narrator was also a bit quiet and airy which made it easy to mind wander at times.