This book has been for decades a symbol of the worst kind of mainstream stereotyping of mountain people. Not that it lacks literary merit, but precisely because it is a compelling read that was made into a successful Hollywood movie. The plot centers around a trip by relatively privileged young Atlanta men who are running the raging Chattooga River which forms the border between Georgia and South Carolina just south of the North Carolina line. They relate to the "locals" as primitives, and the locals act accordingly.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1970. Hardback in dust jacket.