Fishkisser99's post reminded me about the great information contained in one of the books I read for a course in Hydrology. Fluvial Forms & Processes A New Perspective by David Knighton. This book gives into fairly technical detail, but there are quite a few basic ideas that can be had from reading it. In particular, the first couple chapters can give you some pretty good insight into what is going on with that slide in terms of erosion processes.

However, be forewarned, this would probably be dry reading for most of you, but an interesting read on a day when all the rivers are brown and you wonder why...