Critical Compendium

Riding Toward Everywhere, by William T. Vollmann

“If trains, connoting the eternally expanding frontier, have long served as a potent symbol for our fair nation, then trainhopping represents an outlaw strain of the American dream. William T. Vollmann must know this, because in Riding Toward Everywhere, his part-memoir, part-report, full-on paean to trainhopping, he hardly goes five pages without affirming that dangerous, true Americanism he associates with his gonzo hobby.” Read the review at the Village Voice.

Filed under: Memoir, Nonfiction, Travel | Posted 02.04.08 | Comments: None

Riding Toward Everywhere, by William T. Vollman

“Contempt for my privileged railroad follies may be warranted,” William T. Vollman concedes in the first chapter of “Riding Toward Everywhere” (HarperCollins, 288 pages, $26.95), his account of train-hopping in the contemporary American West. He knows that a fortunate man who does for kicks what a less fortunate man does out of desperation is suspect, and he wants us to know that he knows. But he also knows that riding the railcars as a recreational hobo “gives me pleasure and makes me braver,” and so he’s willing to risk seeming a “dilettante or a hypocrite” if his writing can do for us what his travels have done for him.” Read the review at the New York Sun.

Filed under: Memoir, Nonfiction, Travel | Posted 01.22.08 | Comments: None

Trading in Memories: Travels Through a Scavenger’s Favorite Places, by Barbara Hodgson

“Her new book, an offbeat travelogue entitled Trading in Memories: Travels Through a Scavenger’s Favorite Places is a trip through bazaars and markets around the world which shows where many of those bits and pieces were found. Whether as creative sparks for a new project or critical components to a work-in-progress, everything Hodgson uncovers becomes a source for some literary project. As lushly illustrated as all of her other works, Trading in Memories is a beautiful book that enlightens as to the working of a writer’s mind while also serving as something lovely to page through.” Read the review at Bookslut.

Filed under: Nonfiction, Travel | Posted 01.19.08 | Comments: None

Whatever You Do, Don’t Run: True Tales of a Botswana Safari Guide, by Peter Allison

“When wandering through the Botswanian wilderness, you could ask for no better ally than Peter Allison. An experienced safari guide with a genuine love for the country and its animals, Allison’s debut, Whatever You Do, Don’t Run: True Tales of a Botswana Safari Guide recounts his experiences.” Read the review at Bookslut.

Filed under: Essays, Nonfiction, Travel | Posted 01.19.08 | Comments: None

The Geography of Bliss: One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places in the World, by Eric Weiner

“If happiness, as National Public Radio correspondent Eric Weiner’s own research suggests, is primarily connected to our ability to have intimate and nourishing relationships with loved ones, Weiner seems doomed from the get-go. He set out to explore 10 bizarre and exotic locations around the world hoping to find clues between contentment and geography. His goal was to examine the relationship between a physical place and a sense of well-being, and this inevitably led him to consider the connections between happiness and everything else: love, money, spirituality, expectations, meaningful work, religion, nature and the freedom one feels to behave in a moral manner.” Read the review at the Denver Post.

Filed under: Nonfiction, Travel | Posted 01.18.08 | Comments: None

Autonauts of the Cosmoroute, by Julio Cortázar

‘The last book by Julio Cortázar (1914–84), the celebrated Argentinean postmodernist, does not look like a love story. Finally translated by Anne McLean, “Autonauts of the Cosmoroute” has the appearance of a novelty, a travelogue set on the blasé freeway that connects Paris with Marseille. A second glance, reading into the prologue, suggests that the travelogue may be no more than an elaborate, mock-heroic gag, in which Cortázar and his co-author, Carol Dunlop, explore a series of highway rest stops with all the seriousness of a Cortés. Call it Quixotic.’ Read the review at the New York Sun.

Filed under: Nonfiction, Travel | Posted 12.24.07 | Comments: None

Smile When You’re Lying, by Chuck Thompson

‘Easily the question most often asked of us on this job is, “Yeah, but do you read the whole book?” The answer, of course, is yes, we do. And are we ever glad that’s our policy, because if we’d given up on Chuck Thompson’s collection of travel essays, this would have been a much different review.’ Read the review at Time Out Chicago.

Filed under: Essays, Nonfiction, Travel | Posted 12.20.07 | Comments: None