The Longest Road

April 29, 2013
Faced with a double dose of mortality—his father’s death and the prospect of turning 70—Caputo decided in 2011 to live a long-dormant dream. He hitched an Airstream trailer to a pickup truck and drove from the southernmost point of the continental U.S (Key West, Fla.) to the northernmost point (Deadhorse, Ala.). During the trip, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author (A Rumor of War) asked people he encountered one burning question: what keeps the nation together during this wobbly period of high unemployment and political fragmentation? Caputo avoids an exercise in earnest, neon-flashing patriotism by simply letting his smalltown subjects talk. The interviewees—including a husband-and-wife missionary team, a French-speaking saloon owner, and a young man looking for hope in a desperate Indian reservation—yield uncluttered insight into the makeup of the American spirit. Caputo also provides ample historical background to the trip’s sites and a nice dose of humor. Curious and genuine, he weaves these elements together to produce a continental tale that is always engaging and frequently reassuring.

June 1, 2013
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Caputo (Crossers, 2009, etc.) chronicles his journey with a vintage Airstream trailer from the southernmost point of the United States to the northernmost reachable point in Deadhorse, Ala., in hopes of discovering what keeps this country united. Whether he's panning for gold in the Arctic Circle campground, taking pictures of buffalo in Theodore Roosevelt National Park or riding gaited horses through the Meramec Valley, one thing's for certain: This reporter has more stamina in him than your average 21-year-old. A few months shy of his 70th birthday, Caputo became re-inspired to discover America by driving cross-country (accompanied by his wife and dogs). In this hybrid memoir/history lesson, Caputo muses on such topics as immigration, foreclosure, and the pros and cons of technology's influence when traveling ("when [it] was in GPS mode, [the android phone] removed the elements of unpredictability that made travel an adventure"). In the strongest sections, the author records his conversations with both tourists and townsmen--though the historical footnotes often distract from the primary narrative. From chatting with West Virginia missionaries in Key West, to volunteering with the Red Cross in tornado-ravaged Tuscaloosa, to bartering his lawn-mowing services in exchange for room and board on a Meramec Valley horse farm, Caputo creates captivating portraits of a wide variety of communities. His most gripping discussions include his interviews with couples that were forced to downsize, teens that would rather work the land than work online ("you hear more about Lindsay Lohan than you do about crop prices"), and restaurant owners struggling to survive in obsolete towns. Although Caputo doesn't stumble upon a shared consensus from all his interviewees, he eventually learns that America thrives on both optimism and second chances. This personal collection of tales, yarns and folklore may not be enough to cure readers' wanderlust, but it does provide a diverse and acutely observed portrait of our country.

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Starred review from May 1, 2013
Miles traveled: 8,314. Vistas condemned: wind turbine farms. Vistas endorsed: the Natchez Trace and the Alaska Highway. Lesson learned: don't drive a trailer where you can't get it out. Such were Caputo's concrete experiences on a 2011 road trip in search of answers to a more ethereal question, What unifies America? That query, if already asked by literary roadsters like Jack Kerouac and John Steinbeck, bears repeating by writers of any stature, whether unknown or, like Caputo, renowned. Looking at age 70, Caputo felt a bucket-list impetus to drive the furthest border-to-border route in America: Key West, Florida, to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. With his pickup truck towing a symbol of highway wanderlust, an Airstream trailer, Caputo convinced his two dogs and, perhaps less quickly, his wife to climb aboard. Vowing to avoid interstates and motels, he loosely followed the historic route of Lewis and Clark. Injecting misadventures into the narrative, Caputo recounts an overland voyage that emphasizes the people he meets: Christian evangelicals; volunteers helping tornado-struck Tuscaloosa, Alabama; a Missouri farmer; residents of Pine Ridge Indian Reservation; and an assortment of Alaskan eccentrics. Pithily capturing their characters and opinions about the state of America, Caputo snares reading devotees of a classic American theme, the road trip. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: A new book from the Pulitzer Prizewinning Caputo, famed for his soldier's memoir of the Vietnam conflict, A Rumor of War (1977), is always an event.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)

January 1, 2013

In 2011, award-winning/best-selling author Caputo connected two distant points in America by driving from Key West to Deadhorse, on Alaska's North Slope.

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