Since I haven't read the novel myself yet, I'm just going to include here this wonderful review of it that was posted at amazon.ca, where you can also purchase the book for yourself.

Although she is somewhat neglected today, for more than three decades Edna Ferber was considered one of America's premiere authors. While her work included short stories and theatre, she was most famous for her novels, most of which focused on strong women coping with errant men in panoramic settings. SHOW BOAT was one of her first great successes. Today the story is better known through its musical theatre incarnation and the two film versions the stage show generated, one in 1936 directed by James Whale and starring Irene Dunne and one in the 1951 directed by George Sidney and starring Katherine Grayson. But while the stage and screen versions have their charms, none really captures the epic nature of Ferber's novel, which is as much about America as it is about the story of post-Civil War show folk who ply their trade on "The Cotton Blossom"--a floating theatre that travels the nation's waterways, most particularly the mighty Mississippi.

The story concerns three generations of women: Parthenia Hawks, a ram-rod upright New Englander who heartily disapproves of her husband's decision to purchase a show boat and involve the family with actors, God forbid; her daughter Magnolia, whose fresh beauty eventually propells her fame as one of the most popular actresses on the river; and her granddaughter Kim, who becomes a Broadway star. But the backbone of the story concerns Magnolia's ill-fated love for ne'er-do-well gambler Gaylord Ravenal, a love that tests her strength to the last degree. Just as Magnolia has to change to meet her constantly shifting circumstances, so is the nation changing around her, gradually shifting from a rather innocent, rural society to a much more hardened and sophistocated urban world. And Magnolia's adventures will take her from the savage natural beauty of the mighty Mississippi to the gambling dens and brothels of 'Gilded Age' Chicago to the jumpiness of the 1920's 'Great White Way' of New York.

Ferber was more of a popular than a literary writer, and her style here is very much of the 1910s and 1920s--but her prose is strong and clean, her imagery is magnificent, and as she tells her episodic story of a life and a nation in transition she weaves a number of interesting threads into the tapestry: the poverty of the beaten South, racial oppression, social caste, hypocrisy, and changing tastes in fashion and art. And always, always there is the great river: indifferent to the humanity that clings to its banks and travels its back, by turns placid and savage, graceful and dangerous. Ultimately the river becomes a metaphor for both the rapid changes in America and for the often dangerous power of love, and unlike the stage and film versions there will be few happy endings for the characters as they are swept through life's torrent very much as the Cotton Blossom is swept along the currents. It is a memorable package, and while Ferber would go on to write a great many other novels (including the famous GIANT), SHOW BOAT is perhaps her single best work. Recommended.