Lost in America: A Dead-End Journey

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RetailColby Buzzell has always been a loner. An autodidact who never went to college, he was dubbed “the voice of a generation” by Robert Kurson for his daring and critically acclaimed book, My War: Killing Time in Iraq. Half a decade later, overwhelmed by the birth of his son and the death of his mother, Buzzell finds himself rudderless. Desperate to escape the constraints of his postwar existence, he packs his things, gets in the car, and, for five months, drives across America—no map, no destination. In his 1965 Mercury Comet, Buzzell travels through the bowels of a country steeped in economic turmoil and political malaise. With a bottle of whisky in one hand and a pack of cigarettes in the other, he takes us on a tour of big-box stores, grimy gas stations, abandoned warehouses, strip clubs, and flophouses. He captures the distinct voices and vivid stories of a forgotten America—Cheyenne, Omaha, Salt Lake City, Des Moines, Detroit, and San Francisco’s Tenderloin. Buzzell unearths America’s bones in all their beauty and starkness. And like the veterans of Hemingway’s Lost Generation, he struggles to reconcile his wanderlust with his responsibilities as a man and a father. Lost in America is a stunning account of the ravages of war on one individual. It also reveals deep truths about a more universal journey: the struggle to find our place in the world—without a map. Review"Defiant... this is an exploration of our nation at its most raw and browbeaten." --The Daily Beast "Buzzell's voice--tough, jaded, sardonic... speaks for a generation unmoored by economic stagnation and diminishing opportunity." --Columbia Journalism Review "A gift for seeing the seamier side of life as an adventure in a lower key... Buzzell is a useful mix of scholar and tramp, serving as an interesting travel guide...  a shrewd observer of some things the rest of us would otherwise miss." --Malibu Magazine "In a voice that is blunt, sarcastic and viscerally honest... searching for what was once the American dream... Buzzell writes with a jolting, unique voice." --The Providence Journal "A witty, fearless, sharp-eyed chronicler of America in decline. Buzzell exhibits a Henry Miller-like talent for the memorable character sketch." --Kirkus ReviewsFrom the Back CoverA stunning portrait of modern America by Colby Buzzell, the critically acclaimed author of My War: Killing Time in Iraq. Recounting his five-month journey through the country, from its thriving coastlines to its rust-belt wrecks, Buzzell reveals a paradoxical landscape of American dreams both achieved and broken, manifest destinies claimed and refuted, and community ties pulled apart and patched together. In the tradition of John Steinbeck's Travels with Charley, Buzzell's Lost in America uncovers the stark realities of our national character even as it explores the deepest questions of identity, unity, and fatherhood.