• Walking to Listen: What I Heard Hiking 4,000 Miles Across the Highways of America Bloomsbury USA (New York, NY), 2017

1. Walking to listen : what I heard hiking 4,000 miles across the highways of America LCCN 2016011678 Type of material Book Personal name Forsthoefel, Andrew, author. Main title Walking to listen : what I heard hiking 4,000 miles across the highways of America / Andrew Forsthoefel. Published/Produced New York : Bloomsbury USA, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing, Plc, [2017] Projected pub date 1704 Description pages cm ISBN 9781632867001 (hardcover : alk. paper)

• Walking To Listen - book / author site - https://walkingtolisten.com/about-the-walker/

  About me
  I’m a writer based in Northampton, Massachusetts. After graduating from Middlebury College in 2011 with a B.A. in Environmental Studies, I spent eleven months walking across the United States, recording interviews with the people I met along the way. I co-produced a radio documentary about my walk that was featured on Transom.org and This American Life, and my book, Walking to Listen, will be published in April 2017 by Bloomsbury. I teach walking and listening as practices in connective presence wherever I am invited, and hang my shingle as a speaker, too, melding unscripted wondering, discussion, and storytelling as fodder for the collective conversation about the experience of being human.

• Living To Listen - current "Walking To Listen" and Andrew Forsthoefel site - http://livingtolisten.com/about/

  I’m an author, speaker, and peace activist living in the Pioneer Valley of western Massachusetts. After graduating from college, I spent eleven months trekking across the United States with a sign on my pack that read “Walking to Listen,” recording interviews with the people I met along the way. I co-produced a radio documentary about this project that was featured on Transom.org and This American Life, and my book, Walking to Listen (Bloomsbury, 2017), tells the tale of the journey.
  Drawing from the experiences of my year-long initiation on the road, and from the abundance of lived fodder that comes from an active contemplative practice, I offer my work as a contribution to the collective project of learning how to be human together with love—united by our diversity, empowered by sharing the inherent vulnerability of being alive, and freed by opening to truth.

  This work comes in three ways: I write, putting my wonder to words. I speak, spinning stories and mining them for insight. And I teach, exploring the practice of listening as a catalyst for connective presence, personal transformation, and peacemaking.

• Alastair Humphreys - http://www.alastairhumphreys.com/andrew-forsthoefel/

  Life is fast, I’m Slowing Down
  #GrandAdventures

  These days, every adventurer also seems to claim themselves to be photographers and film makers and authors and bloggers. So I was immediately drawn to Andrew Forsthoefel’s tale because, not only did he walk across America, he documented it through audio. This is such a different story-telling medium to pictures and video. To do it well, I’d hazard, is very hard indeed.

  And Andrew did it very well. He produced this wonderful radio documentary about the people he met along the way. I highly recommend it to anyone – adventurers, story-tellers, people on their commute. It’s great.

  I chatted to him on Skype as part of my ongoing Grand Adventures series of interviews . It’s not short, but it is good…

  Andrew Forsthoefel

  Alastair: Hi Andrew. Can you give us a brief explanation of what your trip was?

  Andrew: I graduated from college in May 2011 with a ton of questions, unsure of what I wanted to do, and figured I’d try to create around myself a situation that would help me engage those questions. I thought I might go abroad for a little bit but then I got fired from a job and didn’t have the money I thought I would have. So I figured I’d just start walking and keep it simple.
  I wore a sign that said, “Walking to Listen” and the idea was to get people curious and hopefully they’d stop and share a story or a piece of advice. And that was pretty much it.
  I had a few basic rules: walk every mile that was possible to walk. And camp out more than not because that’s all I could afford. But really I just wanted to try to meet people, you know? And so I spent a little under eleven months, a little over four thousand miles walking from Chadds Ford, PA to New Orleans, and then to San Francisco.

  Alastair: And roughly, how much did it cost?

  Andrew: I didn’t keep the books as meticulously as I wish I had, but it cost, appropriately with this project that you’re doing, it cost less than a thousand dollars. Because of the way people helped me along the way.

  Alastair: That’s wonderful. That’s a heck of a long walk. You’re the longest walker that I’ve spoken to on this so far. The previous record is a guy called Andy who decided in the pub one night to walk across the continent and then started two days later.

  Andrew: That’s amazing.

  Alastair: Did you have you much experience? Are you an experienced hiker or adventurer or was this all new for you as well?

  Andrew: It was fairly new. I went to school in Vermont which is beautiful mountain country so I had certainly hiked before, but I had never done anything quite like this and it was fairly last minute. I mean, it wasn’t anything like Andy’s spontaneity but I lost my job and then six weeks later I was walking.

  Alastair: Why did you walk rather than going on a bicycle or something?

  Andrew: The main idea behind it was slowing down. I wanted to slow down and I had all these questions and I felt like … It didn’t feel like going onward with my life at the rate I had been going would do anything to help to answer those questions. So slowing down, walking, was just a great metaphor for that and it was literally, you know, slowing down and trying to appreciate what’s around you. Something about it just appealed to me. I like the simplicity of it. I didn’t know a whole lot about bikes and bike mechanics.

  Alastair: Do you think of yourself as an adventurer?

  Andrew: I would say yes. I think the meaning of that word has changed and sort of grown for me in recent years. And maybe in one of the most important ways it’s that adventure focuses around people for me. I think when I started this walk, the idea of adventure was just your classic diving into the unknown and seeing what’s going to happen, which is still the case, but for me this year was so defined by the people I met. And I can’t help but correlate adventure with people now. And I kind of like that, you know. The unknown in people is something that fascinates me.

  Alastair: That’s interesting, that it’s the human side. I recently, before this, I interviewed a young woman called Sarah Outen who’s currently making her way around the whole world. Cycling across the land parts and then rowing by herself across the ocean parts.

  Andrew: Oh wow. Wow.

  Alastair: And I asked her which she preferred, the solitude of the oceans or the human side of the cycling because they’re both diametrically opposite, but both definitely adventurous and she struggled to come up with a good answer. To you it’s the people?

  Andrew: Yeah, well that’s interesting. It reminds me that it was built into the structure of the walk that I did, where at the end of day, almost invariably, I would be with somebody. Whether that was somebody who would take me in, or I’d be at a gas station hanging out with somebody or at a bar or church, or whatever, and it would be an amazing connection almost all the time. But then at the end of the night, or the next morning I was ready to be alone again. And then, invariably, I would be alone because I’d have to walk. It was a nice balance because it did give me time to sort of process those interactions, get back in touch with the land and some of that solitude. Which I think is also part of the adventure and something I’m attracted to.

  Alastair: When I cycled around the world I found that I loved the solitude and I hated the loneliness. And there’s a very fine line between the two.

  Andrew: Yeah, yeah.

  Alastair: I felt that the human encounters that made the trip so wonderful also massively added to the sense of loneliness on the stages between the people.

  Andrew: Yeah.

  Alastair: Did you feel much loneliness or was it just solitude?

  Andrew: I felt less lonely than I thought I would. But there were times, of course, when I felt lonely. And you know when you’re having these moments of, “Oh my God, I can’t believe I’m experiencing this” and I don’t get to share it with anybody. I think maybe as human beings there’s this natural desire to communicate and tell our stories to each other and revel in these experiences together. Not being able to do that in the moment was hard sometimes, but I think it made those moments when you could share something with somebody much more special.
  I think the solitude and sometimes loneliness – but just that aloneness, really accentuated those times when I was hanging out with people. I remember somewhere in Texas I’d been on the road for five or six months, I was walking and I was bored and I tried to trace where I had spent each night…

  Alastair: I used to do that too.

  Andrew: Yeah, and I could do it! You know, each day was so memorable and so special in its own way that I could remember literally every night that had gotten me to that point. I couldn’t do that now.

  Alastair: I liked on your website a line that says, “Life is fast, I’m slowing down.” That was really nice. That would be a good strap line for your book, I think.

  Andrew: Yeah, yeah.

  Alastair: When I cycled round the world I got used to traveling at roughly ten to twelve miles an hour and that’s how your world unfolds. Then I set off to walk across the bottom of India and I’m suddenly down to maybe three miles an hour. I found that, at first, massively frustrating.

  Andrew: Ha! I was wondering what are the differences.

  Alastair: Well when you see that there’s five miles to the next place you can get some water, instead of that being a 20 minute coast, it’s an hour and a half’s misery plod! But I came to enjoy and appreciate the simplicity and the slowness of it very much.

  Andrew: Cool. Did you prefer one to the other?

  Alastair: I preferred cycling.

  Andrew: Oh. Why?

  Alastair: I think I’m quite … hey I’m meant to be asking the questions here!
  I think that cycling is the perfect compromise between being slow enough to stop if you want to but quick enough to cover some distance if you want to. You carry all of your kit on the bike and it doesn’t hurt your feet quite so much. But I did appreciate the slowness. I walked through a desert last year and we spent a lot of time on that thinking, “Maybe we should have done this by bicycle.”
  Another thing on your website that struck me was saying that you were heading cross country in search of stories. That reminds me of another guy I interviewed recently called Steve who hitchhiked right away from the UK all the way to Malaysia. The thing that he loves about hitchhiking is that you are trapped in a vehicle with someone and you have to get that story. I think the story side of an adventure is something that is popular with quite a few people.

  Andrew: Yeah. That’s cool. I mean ‘story’ to me is just another word for ‘connection’. It’s like a way of simplifying the complexity of our lives and of who we are. I was amazed at how interested people were in sharing. A part of me believed when I left that I wouldn’t meet a single person in my entire walk across North America. But that was so far from the case. People were really excited about it and when I asked them if they were interested in recording interviews, very rarely were people not inclined to say, “yes,” …

  Alastair: I wonder if that’s partly because of your choice of medium, too. Audio is less intimidating… Why did you decide to record all this stuff and why did you decide to do it by audio?

  Andrew: I decided to use audio because it was a medium I was familiar with. I had done a little bit of audio work in college. It’s also, it seems to me, a little easier. I also like that it’s less intrusive, and that it’s only the person’s voice. There’s something about audio/radio that gets into you. The listener can make it their own because it’s this dreamy, dreamy transference of one person into another. You can’t see the face and so you’re sort of imagining it.
  As for why I recorded anything at all, I wonder about that sometimes myself, you know. I think there are a couple of reasons. One is that I was doing this thing alone and so wanted to share in that, and then wanting to remember. It’s amazing how easily we forget and so recording some of these voices is a way for me to remember. I can only imagine how grateful I’ll be, if and when I’m an 80-year-old man, listening back to Otho Rogers and Emmalou Daily and Marian Furman, you know. Interviewing can be a way to immerse yourself even more deeply into the present moment with somebody.

  Alastair: A friend of mine called Nick Hand, he cycled the whole way around Britain, around the coast, I’ll send you the link. He met artists and artisans along the way – people, craftsmen – that was his project, the whole way around Britain. He was photographing and recording sounds. It’s beautiful.

  Andrew: Ah. Very cool.

  Alastair: And you also said on your website that you had no final destination when you set off. I think that’s really cool. I think there’s a danger when people set off on big trips if they’re all consumed by the end that they can forget to appreciate the ‘now’.

  Andrew: Yeah, I didn’t want there to be that pressure. I didn’t want it to be framed in terms of success or failure. Like, if you don’t make it to a certain place, you didn’t do it. You didn’t win or something. It’s crazy. So holding lightly the end point was a nice strategy to appreciate the present moment and dig into what’s here and now instead of focusing on what’s maybe going to happen months from now. I’d do it the same way if I had to do it over again.

  Alastair: That’s cool. One thing that people ask me about going off on trips that they’re worried about the dangers of people out in the world. Did you worry about that beforehand and how did the actual reality manifest itself?

  Andrew: I didn’t worry about it so much that it prevented me from going but especially at the beginning, every day without fail, around two o’clock in the afternoon, I would feel fear and I would start to freak out, thinking “where am I going to sleep tonight?” The anxiety of not knowing where you’ll be resting your head was intense until I got used to it. But the more I did it the more I saw it work out in some way or another every time. Whether it was getting taken in or finding a secret little bridge to sleep under or something, the less afraid I became.
  But people have said, “Okay, you’re a white male and there is a lot of privilege involved in that,” as unjust as it is and I wonder, like, how would that have been different if I didn’t look the way I did. Granted, people who don’t look like me have walked across America and so it can be done and they’re heroes, but I do wonder about the privileges of identity.

  Alastair: Give me one example of ridiculous kindness from a random stranger.

  Andrew: Oh man. This is a hard question because there are hundreds. There was the Verette family in Sulphur, Louisiana, who pulled over in their van, they had, I think, six kids together, this young couple. And the first words out of Willie’s mouth, the dad, were, “Would you like to refresh yourself at our house?” No bones about it, just “come on in.”
  There was a moment in Arizona where I was walking through Navajo reservation land and I’d met a grandma and her granddaughter at a gas station and they said, “When you make it to our town, we’ll cook for you.” And a couple of days later I made it to their town which, it turned out, was just like an intersection in the middle of the desert somewhere and they’d brought out a tent and their neighbors came out and they cooked this feast for me, which is just – it’s insane. It’s ridiculous. I almost feel, I mean, totally humbled of course, but almost embarrassed at how good these people were to me and yeah, I guess you’ve just got to receive that graciously.
  But to feel so celebrated is a remarkable thing and I think that’s another reason why I felt compelled to make the radio piece and why I’m excited about writing my book. I felt so supported and celebrated in my walk and so I want to give that back and celebrate these people who were just, time and time again, so amazing to me and for me.

  Alastair: This idea of kindness is a common theme out of everyone I’ve spoken to and, as you say, it is quite humbling and embarrassing and sometimes quite hard to accept. I interviewed Anna Hughes and she cycled four thousand miles around Britain, but she didn’t like sleeping in a tent. So she needed to get a bed for every night of the trip and she didn’t have a huge amount of money so that essentially involved just staying with friends of friends of friends, and random strangers. She was very anxious at first that she was just sponging off people. But someone told her along the way that it was important to accept but not to expect.

  Andrew: Yes!

  Alastair: What impact did this walk have on your life, then? You started as a young guy just out of university. You probably – society and perhaps your bank manager too – expected that you ought to just go get a proper job and settle down but you chose something very different.

  Andrew: I think at the basic level, it helped me understand that the possibilities are far greater than I maybe initially thought. What I can do – what we can do, where that can happen, where that can go. Having faith in myself. Having faith in people, and faith in the way things just work out. That maybe means that I’m a little less afraid in general.
  I can’t help but think in terms of the walk and all these little metaphors. At the end of the day, you’re walking, you don’t know where you’re going to sleep and you’re kind of freaking out but you don’t have to, you know. And if I can hold on to that sort of idea as I continue walking my life, I think that will make things a little bit easier.

  Alastair: What’s next for you, then? Any more big walks?

  Andrew: Maybe. I miss walking, I do. I hesitate too. I don’t want to try to recreate the past. I’m aware of that dynamic and not wanting to feel like I’m trying to resurrect something that’s over.

  Alastair: Your glory days…

  Andrew: Yeah. Exactly, But I’m also aware that walking, you know, it allows you access to some things, to certain parts of yourself and of the human experience that just aren’t accessible otherwise. So, if I’m an old man and I look back and I haven’t done another little or long walk maybe I’ll regret that.

  Alastair: The aim of this Adventure1000 thing is to persuade people to stop looking at adventure as some sort of vicarious thing that other people do and to stop looking at it as something they wish they could do if only… And to actually commit to a plan and get out that front door and go. What would your advice be to someone who is perhaps dreaming of an adventure like you, but is too scared or too tied down with life to actually make it happen?

  Andrew: Well, as you’ve said before in this conversation, and in other forums, it’s all about the first step. And I think believing in yourself, even if you don’t – which is sort of counter-intuitive – but forcing yourself to believe in yourself. And to take the first step and then realize that you’ve done it. And that everything after that is a success. Even if you’re miserable, it’s happening.

  Alastair: Walking across American is really not much harder than just going for a walk for the weekend.

  Andrew: Yes. Yeah, I mean that’s another thing I would say to anyone who’s aspiring to do something like this. People would often say to me, “I can’t believe you’re doing this.” They’d just express their disbelief and I would almost feel guilty in that moment because in many ways, walking across America was the easiest thing in the world. These people who are supporting families and working these jobs, whatever the job may be, you know, it’s so much harder. So that, I would imagine, could be a catalyst, realizing that it’s actually the easiest thing ever.

  Alastair: The other thing I think is important, I don’t know if you’d agree with me, is that, what you did sounds like this enormous trip and that’s quite daunting when you’re thinking about it. But it’s important to realize that once you set off, if you walk for a hundred miles, two hundred miles, then realize you absolutely hate it, you can just get a bus back home and get back to normal life again. An adventure is not the end of the world, an irreversible one-way ticket.

  Andrew: Yeah, absolutely. And that type of perspective, I think, is the one I tried to set off with. Okay, I can walk a hundred miles and that’ll be a success, I can walk a thousand miles and that’ll be a success, you know? So going into it with that sort of openness, to adapt and be flexible sets you up for inevitable success. You’re going to get something out of it.
  But also, not thinking too much about it, when you embark on something like this, it’s not really useful to dwell on the enormity of it because it is daunting. And if you really think too hard about it, you won’t do it, because it is ridiculous and impossible but then it’s not after you have done it.

  Alastair: Brilliant. And one final question for you: if I was to give you a thousand dollars right now to go do some sort of big adventure, discounting what you would have already done for that sum, what would you do?

  Andrew: I think I’d try to get old people involved somehow, I don’t know how. Maybe another walk, I think I’ll probably have a hard time not focusing some larger adventure around walking. To sort of have that conversation over the decades would be something I’d be interested in exploring and I might not even need a thousand dollars to do that.

  Alastair: A friend of mine, called Dom Gill, cycled the length of South America, North American on a tandem, but him on his own and it’s called “Take a Seat.” The idea was just to pick people up along the way and share their stories.

  Andrew: Very nice.

  Alastair: I thought it was great. He did that and then he got quite hooked, and he did it again. He started taking fat people, old people and then he set off to cycle across America with an old man who had terminal cancer trying to give him one big adventure before the end. [I’ll send you to his link as well].

  Andrew: That’s great. Yeah, cool.

  Alastair: Thank you very much Andrew.

  Andrew’s website has information about his trip and links to his radio piece.

  My new book, Grand Adventures, is out now.
  It’s designed to help you dream big, plan quick, then go explore.
  The book contains interviews and expertise from around 100 adventurers, plus masses of great photos to get you excited.

  I would be extremely grateful if you bought a copy here today!

  I would also be really thankful if you could share this link on social media with all your friends – http://goo.gl/rIyPHA. It honestly would help me far more than you realise.

  Thank you so much!

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Forsthoefel, Andrew: WALKING TO LISTEN
Kirkus Reviews.
(Feb. 1, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Forsthoefel, Andrew WALKING TO LISTEN Bloomsbury (Adult Nonfiction) $28.00 3, 7 ISBN: 978­1­63286­700­1
A college graduate's 11­month walking tour of America.Following graduation from Middlebury College, 23­year­old
Forsthoefel hatched a plan to leave his mother's home in suburban Philadelphia and walk until he spent all his money or
hit the Pacific Ocean, whichever came first. Guided by his literary heroes Rainer Maria Rilke, Khalil Gibran, and Walt
Whitman (whose democratic spirit is a major influence here), Forsthoefel began traveling west with the bare minimum
for shelter, a sign reading "Walking to Listen," and the vague idea that his trip would be "like a graduate program in the
human experience." For the author, the impetus to walk was indefinable but urgent: "I woke up the next morning
anxious to get walking again, toward what, I didn't quite know." Along the way, Forsthoefel confronted the "others" of
society, and he remarks on race, class, and privilege. He also explains that while a student at Middlebury, he researched
the concept of "coming of age" and how other cultures prepare their young to become adults. It's not hard to see how
this concept informs Forsthoefel's trek, which was his own attempt to define his adulthood in the post­collegiate
existentialist void experienced by so many millennials. However, the author's sincerity and earnestness are tempered by
his urge to "learn something" from his encounters. He refers to the people he met as his "teachers," and he was
consciously aware of his use of their experiences for his gain. (This also cost Forsthoefel his job on a fishing boat prior
to his cross­country journey, when he revealed to the captain that he'd begun a blog about the experience.) The author
recorded his conversations for future logging and transcribing, all a sign of his intention to use his trip for some other
end, not merely the empathic experience of meeting citizens. However, Forsthoefel offers moments of genuine kinship
and transcendence that buoy the narrative and make the adventure an uplifting, somewhat labored exercise in outreach.
Millennial ennui turns into a search for meaning in an intriguing portrait of America.
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
"Forsthoefel, Andrew: WALKING TO LISTEN." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Feb. 2017. General OneFile,
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Walking to Listen: 4000 Miles across America,
One Story at a Time
Bridget Thoreson
Booklist.
113.13 (Mar. 1, 2017): p32.
COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
Full Text:
Walking to Listen: 4000 Miles across America, One Story at a Time.
By Andrew Forsthoefel.
Apr. 2017.400p. Bloomsbury, $28 (9781632867001). 796.51.
There are many different types of walking. Bliss­walking. Fury­walking. Swamp­walking. In his trek across America,
Forsthoefel experienced these and many more, as he shares in this soulful book. A 23­year­old college graduate still
smarting from the pain of his parents' divorce, Forsthoefel set out to grapple with his questions about coming­of­age by
listening his way across the country. And listen he does, to an impressive variety of people, such as an alligator farmer
looking toward the apocalypse, a nudist grandmother, and a sharecropper descended from a slave. Some open their
homes and lives to him, sharing profound lessons in the unlikeliest places. Forsthoefel is disarmingly, almost painfully
earnest, prone to quoting Whitman and Rilke and indulging in extended ruminations on the nature of life. But his
openness provides a window into the extraordinary lessons to be learned from ordinary people. This is a memorable and
heartfelt exploration of what it takes to hike 4,000 miles across the country and how one young man learned to walk
without fear into his future. ­­Bridget Thoreson
YA: There is much for teens to contemplate here, as they, too, set about walking into their futures. BT.
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
Thoreson, Bridget. "Walking to Listen: 4000 Miles across America, One Story at a Time." Booklist, 1 Mar. 2017, p. 32.
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Walking to Listen
Publishers Weekly.
263.32 (Aug. 8, 2016): p51.
COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Walking to Listen
Andrew Forsthoefel. Bloomsbury, $28 (400p) ISBN 978­1­63286­700­1
In 2011, at 23, after his Watson fellowship proposal to study the ways indigenous communities "guided their young
people into adulthood" was rejected, and after he lost his job on a fishing boat, Forsthoefel packed his bags, brought
books by Whitman and Rilke, and walked down the train tracks near his mother's Philadelphia home. Then, he kept
walking, all the way to the Pacific. In this moving and deeply introspective memoir, Forsthoefel writes about the
uncertainties, melodramas, ambiguities, and loneliness of youth while describing his trip, reaching out to strangers as he
walks south toward Selma, and then west across Navajo lands, Death Valley, and the Sierras. Along the way, he meets
widowers, waitresses, ranchers, veterans, reverends, mystics, glass blowers, delusional walkers, firefighters, Navajo
drummers, artists, new fathers, and families who take him into their homes, sharing their rich and varied perspectives­­
and advice on living. Each conversation offers a glimpse into the vast range of American life. Forsthoefel's walk
becomes a meditation on vulnerability, trust, and the tragedy of suburban and rural alienation. His radical openness to
the variety of American experience includes unflinching encounters with lingering racism in Alabama, for instance.
Forsthoefel's conversation with America is fascinating, terrifying, mundane, and at times heartbreaking, but ultimately
transformative and wise. Agent: Daniel Greenberg, Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary. (Apr.)
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
"Walking to Listen." Publishers Weekly, 8 Aug. 2016, p. 51. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA460900386&it=r&asid=60d48d02db53e8259fe8a375df4b7cba.
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Timely tellings: memoir highlights 2017 (so far)
Library Journal.
142.3 (Feb. 15, 2017): p104.
COPYRIGHT 2017 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution
permitted.
http://www.libraryjournal.com/
Full Text:
LJ's memoir columnists and reviewers help celebrate the first quarter of 2017 with four starred reviews from the
monthly online column, a book about love of urban gardening, and, just in time for Valentine's Day, three titles that deal
with making marriage work in these troubled times.
* Andreas, Peter. Rebel Mother: My Childhood Chasing the Revolution. S. & S. Apr. 2017.336p. photos. ISBN
9781501124396. $26; ebk. ISBN 9781501124457. MEMOIR
After becoming radicalized during the late 1960s, former Mennonite and housewife Carol Andreas became obsessed
with making "the revolution" happen, kidnapped her son, Peter, and moved to South America. Eventually, they made
their way back to the United States, where they lived in hiding. Although infuriating and terribly misguided, she is
portrayed as affectionate, understanding, and full of acceptance. Andreas (John Hay Professor of International Studies,
Brown Univ.; Smuggler Nation: How Illicit Trade Made America) uses an interesting, straightforward style that early on
relates his life as though through a child's eyes. Yet, as the narrative progresses, and the author grows older, he becomes
increasingly critical of his mother's actions. In the end, he is thankful for the experiences she gave him, even though
their relationship has become increasingly strained. This comprehensive account involves a parallel story line about
Carol's divorce from Andreas's father, Carl, and Carl's attempts to gain custody of his son. VERDICT A profound and
enlightening memoir that will open readers up to different ideas about love, acceptance, and the bond between mother
and son.
[See Prepub Alert, 10/24/16; Memoir, 1/13/17, ow.ly/Dlmr308cbNW]­­Derek Sanderson, Mount Saint Mary Coll.,
Newburgh, NY
Brownmiller, Susan. My City Highrise Garden. Rutgers Univ. Mar. 2017.152p. photos. ISBN 9780813588896. $25.
MEMOIR
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In this charming collection of essays, feminist journalist, activist, and author Brownmiller (memoir, Rutgers Univ.;
Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape) writes with passion, humor, and complete candidness about 35 years of
gardening on the 20th­floor terrace of her Greenwich Village apartment. Along with weather, climate, and critter issues,
Brownmiller also describes unique gardening problems that a more traditional yard gardener couldn't fathom, such as
building renovations and neighbors unappreciative of leaf drift­­although plenty of them are eager to share plants and
pots for Brownmiller's urban oasis, too. From stories of the loss of her beloved birch trees in the wake of a hurricane to
tales of victory at her garden's thrilling achievements, the author reveals all, including the odd assortment of detritus she
discovered thrown down from the shared rooftop garden above. VERDICT With a style reminiscent of Eric Grissell's
Thyme on My Hands and A Journal in Thyme, Brownmiller's meandering musings will delight readers. Memoir lovers
and gardeners alike will enjoy these adventures in urban gardening­­Venessa Hughes, Buffalo, NY
* Forsthoefel, Andrew. Walking To Listen: 4,000 Miles Across America, One Story at a Time.
Bloomsbury USA. Mar. 2017. 400p. maps, bibliog. ISBN 9781632867001. $28; ebk. ISBN 9781632867025. MEMOIR
Unsure of what to do after graduating from college, Forsthoefel decided to walk across America, from Pennsylvania to
the Pacific coast, and listen to the fascinating stories of ordinary people. Forsthoefel includes chunks of many of these
tales verbatim. But what is even more fascinating, and unexpected, is the journey he goes through himself. Guided by
Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass and Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet­­both of which he quotes from
copiously­­he discovers what he can endure, what he is capable of, and finds his place in the world. For the author, what
started out as an attempt to understand our connections to other people ends in a greater understanding of a connection
with himself. VERDICT A remarkable book that calls to mind William Least­Heat Moon's Blue Highways. (Memoir,
1/13/17; ow.ly/Dlmr308cbNW)­­DS
* Gerson, Stephane. Disaster Falls: A Family Story. Crown Archetype. Jan. 2017.272p. ISBN 9781101906699. $26;
ebk. ISBN 9781101906705. MEMOIR
This diamond­sharp book is both meticulous and breathtaking. With methodical pacing and painstaking detail, the
author describes how his eight­year­old son Owen died in a rafting accident on Utah's Green River, at a place called
Disaster Falls. It is evident that Gerson is driven by a desire to get it right, to tell the full story of the accident, including
its aftermath and preceding events. And while he takes us to the precipice of the fatality, it's as if the accident is
secondary to the larger story. This creates a narrative tension in the passage about the incident itself. Though we know
the outcome, we hold our breath as he and Owen approach the falls in a raft: we hope that it will end differently. Gerson
also connects these events to the loss of his father in the year after his son's death, and in this way offers a meditation on
the connection between fathers and sons. VERDICT A beautiful book, even as it deals with unthinkable anguish.
(Memoir, 10/17/16; ow.ly/5jnF308ccrE)­­Rachael Dreyer, Eberly Family Special Collections Lib,. Pennsylvania State
Univ.
* Leiris, Antoine. You Will Not Have My Hate. Penguin Pr. Oct. 2016.144p. tr. from French by Sam Taylor. ISBN
9780735222113. $23; ebk. ISBN 9780735222144. MEMOIR
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Here is a short and brilliant treatise on grief and loss as experienced in brilliant the immediate aftermath of tragedy. On
November 13, 2015, Leiris lost his wife, Helene Muyal­Leir, in a terrorist attack at the Bataclan Theater in Paris. Helene
was also survived by their 17­month­old son, Melvil. It was the need to take care of Melvil, and to not allow the
terrorists to "have his hate," that made it necessary for Leiris to continue. As expected, this is a very raw book­­Leiris
says he began composing it just days after the attack­­and as such provides tremendous insight into the early grieving
process.
VERDICT Leiris is to be commended for not providing easy answers nor engaging in the platitudinous language that
too often infects memoirs of this sort. This is necessary reading for us all. [See Prepub Alert, 4/3/16; Memoir, 11/14/16;
ow.ly/pVqe308ccNV.]­­DS
Saldana, Stephanie. A Country Between: Making a Home Where Both Sides of Jerusalem Collide. Sourcebooks. Feb.
2017.368p. ISBN 9781492639053. pap. $15.99; ebk. ISBN 9781492609759.
MEMOIR
In this memoir, Saldana meets monk Frederic in a monastery in Syria, and they fall in love. This sounds like the story's
happy ending (for more on this, read the author's Bread and Angels), but instead, this is where Saldana's narrative starts.
She and Frederic, now a former monk, marry in France yet seek a place to live where they both feel at home.
Both are deeply spiritual and profoundly religious, and they decide that the holy city of Jerusalem should be their first
dwelling together. They rent a rambling house on Nablus Road from Franciscan nuns, on the Palestinian side of the city.
Nablus Road is a colorful and vibrant place, and it is here that they raise their young children. However, on the edge of
East and West Jerusalem, Saldana and her growing family watch as checkpoints spring up in front of their house,
altering the neighborhood's way of life. Even though they ultimately move to a different house, they remain in
Jerusalem, a testament to the couple's full embrace of peace and a commitment to living the lives they chose together.
VERDICT This book about hope in uncertain times reads especially poignantly for anyone looking toward the future.
Saldana writes about her Catholic faith in a way that is inclusive of other traditions as well. (Memoir, 12/12/16;
ow.ly/pfQw308cd7D)­­RD
MARRIAGE­MINDED
Calhoun, Ada. Wedding Toasts I'll Never Give. Norton. May 2017.192p. notes, bibliog. ISBN 9780393254792. $24.95;
ebk. ISBN 9780393254808. Piazza, Jo. How To Be Married: What I Learned from Real Women on Five Continents
About Surviving My First (Really Hard) Year of Marriage. Harmony: Crown. Apr. 2017.304p. bibliog. ISBN
9780451495556. $26; ebk. ISBN 9780451495563. MEMOIR
Ushering in the arrival of the spring wedding season, two writers, both usually identified with other topics, offer their
insights into what keeps the marriage machinery running. Novelist Piazza [The Knockoff) recounts the first year of her
marriage to a man she knew for less than a year. With her parents' own rocky relationship as her only guide to married
life, and the challenges the union faced early on owing to the revelation of a potentially devastating medical diagnosis,
Piazza sets off on a worldwide odyssey in search of advice about how to be married. She seeks guidance from sources
ranging from observant Jewish women in Israel to members of polygamous communities in Kenya with several stops in
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between (including tense discussions with chic French women). Her takeaways include timeless advice (keep talking to
each other), along with updated adages (maybe it is okay to go to sleep angry, especially if you are tired). Piazza's
insistence on maintaining her independence­­even on the dance floor­­despite having become a "wife," lends this
account an uplifting tone.
Calhoun's [St. Marks Is Dead) foray into the world of marital musing began with her oft­shared 2015 New York Times
"Modern Love" column, "The Wedding Toast I'll Never Give," a pithy summation of the realities of marriage from the
point of view of a veteran member of the institution. Calhoun, whose own marriage to a performance artist is in its
second decade, expands upon her original piece in this series of graceful essays that explore the significance of marriage
in a time that no longer deems marriage a necessity. Alternating between hilarious personal anecdote and sobering
professional insight, this memoir conveys perhaps the simplest lesson ever given about learning to make a marriage last:
just don't get divorced. Her other great contribution to the literature on marital happiness might be her explanation of
why fights in cars are the worst: you cannot storm off. VERDICT Piazza and Calhoun approach the conundrum of
connubial happiness from differing (albeit white, heterosexual) vantage points, but with the same endpoint of golden
anniversaries in mind.­­Therese Purcell Nielsen, Huntington P.L., NY Denmon, Randy. Off the Grid: My Ride from
Louisiana to the Panama Canal in an Electric Car.
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
"Timely tellings: memoir highlights 2017 (so far)." Library Journal, 15 Feb. 2017, p. 104+. General OneFile,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA481649170&it=r&asid=c0f1212d5fa4146f1f5692811a0b7f3f.
Accessed 10 Apr. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A481649170

"Forsthoefel, Andrew: WALKING TO LISTEN." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Feb. 2017. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA479234367&it=r. Accessed 10 Apr. 2017. Thoreson, Bridget. "Walking to Listen: 4000 Miles across America, One Story at a Time." Booklist, 1 Mar. 2017, p. 32. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA488689457&it=r. Accessed 10 Apr. 2017. "Walking to Listen." Publishers Weekly, 8 Aug. 2016, p. 51. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA460900386&it=r. Accessed 10 Apr. 2017. "Timely tellings: memoir highlights 2017 (so far)." Library Journal, 15 Feb. 2017, p. 104+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA481649170&it=r. Accessed 10 Apr. 2017.

• Star Tribune
  http://www.startribune.com/review-walking-to-listen-by-andrew-forsthoefel/417712923/
  Word count: 588

  BOOKS 417712923
  REVIEW: 'Walking to Listen,' by Andrew Forsthoefel
  NONFICTION: A young college graduate sets off with a backpack full of books and an eagerness to listen.
  By STEPHEN J. LYONS Special to the Star Tribune MARCH 31, 2017 — 10:35AM
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  The grand American tour is often an east to west rite of passage. For those of us who came of age in the bellbottom decades of the 1960s and ’70s, our inspiration came from Peter Jenkins, whose two books “A Walk Across America,” followed by “The Walk West,” were required reading for restless idealists. I devoured both volumes before hitchhiking from Colorado to San Francisco with a loyal blue heeler named Emmie Lou, a Guild guitar and a cheap Sears backpack. I was 18 at the time, and today, 43 years on, I consider the trip one of my greatest accomplishments.

  In these cautious times of helicopter parenting, when you rarely see a kid alone on a playground, 23-year-old author Andrew Forsthoefel’s 4,000-mile walk from his back door in Pennsylvania to California is all the more remarkable. The recent college graduate felt his life sliding toward “a lifestyle of constant comfort and consumption,” and felt that “something was missing on that path, and it had nothing to do with money or accumulation or achievement.” Forsthoefel longed to understand how other Americans experienced this short “cosmic improbability” of, well, being alive.

  So, rather than follow the straight and narrow, Forsthoefel beat a path out his back door with copies of Walt Whitman, Rainer Maria Rilke and Kahlil Gibran, and an eye-catching sign attached to his backpack that read “WALKING TO LISTEN,” the title of his book.

  Forsthoefel’s 11-month meditative journey in 2011, south to the Gulf Coast, then west across the belly of America, is filled with the kind of heartfelt encounters that would convert the most cynical among us. Strangers open their homes to him, cook him meals, give him money and offer advice.

  In High Point, N.C., when Forsthoefel asks 77-year-old widow Hacky Pitts what she would do differently if she could live her life over, she answers, “I wouldn’t worry so much. I used to worry myself to death, and now I realize, the things you worry about, how many of them come true?”

  In a kitchen in Franklin, La., civil servant Paul Fitch tells Forsthoefel that he has tried to experience everything life has to offer. “I didn’t close myself off to anything. … Most of it was wonderful. Some of it wasn’t. But it’s all learning.”

  Walking to Listen: 4,000 Miles Across America, One Story at a Time, by Andrew Forsthoefel

  Walking to Listen: 4,000 Miles Across America, One Story at a Time, by Andrew Forsthoefel
  As the stories and miles piled up, Forsthoefel realized there was one story he still needed to accept: his own. It was “the only way I was ever going to find peace, otherwise I’d be wandering forever, searching for an impossible something else.”

  Isn’t that always the case, that what we are searching for is right in front of us?

  Stephen J. Lyons is the author of four books, most recently “Going Driftless: Life Lessons From the Heartland for Unraveling Times.”

  Walking to Listen
  By: Andrew Forsthoefel.
  Publisher: Bloomsbury, 371 pages, $28.

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