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Travels with Charley, by John Steinbeck (1962)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: The famed author undertakes a road trip across the United States to reconnect with ‘real America‘, accompanied by a beloved aging pet.

Review: This is a fascinating portrait of a divided country that is still enlightening 65 years later. Cont.

Here‘s my #BookSpinBingo card for June!
My #Bookspin book Is Travels with Charley and
my #doublespin book is The Cliffs by J. Courtney Sullivan.
I made my board by stamping on a printed Bingo card, and writing with Zebra Clickart markers.
Thank you @TheAromaofBooks !

3⭐. It's divided into 4 parts. I thought the 4th part was most interesting. Charlie the dog was precious. It's nonfiction taking place in 1960.

"When I was very young and the urge to be someplace else was on me, I was assured my mature people that maturity would cure this itch."

#FirstLineFridays
@ShyBookOwl

1. About 2 weeks ago.
2. Meandering

#Two4Tuesday
@TheSpineView

“Once a journey is designed, equipped, and put in process, a new factor enters and takes over. A trip, a safari, an exploration, is an entity, different from all other journeys. It has personality, temperament, individuality, uniqueness. A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike.” Loved this book 📖

#DaysDevotedTo
#Go4ARide

@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

“A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it. “

“We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.”

#RoadTrip
#ItTakesAllKinds

@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

1. I learned how to drive a car on a manual. My dad took us to a local street, parked on a hill, and then said, “ok, now drive.” 😖 Anyone who has ever driven stick knows that once you have mastered the art of not rolling backwards on an incline, you‘re golden. 😀
2. Had to tag this book. Although it was a van, not a car. That still counts, right?

#Two4Tuesday

#NewYearNewBooks #VehicleCover
@Eggs @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

#NewYearNewBooks
#HighwayCvr
@Eggs
@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

Another fave. There is a road on the cover! 🤩

Travel book while travelling!

Charley is a delight. Steinbeck is an eloquent witness. He doesn't quite escape being a product of his time, given some of the opinions related about 'real men' (toxic masculinity) and romanticizing early 'explorers and pioneers' (aka colonists), even as he proves quite prescient in concerns raised about growing cities, mass production, nuclear weapons, racism and the subsequent human and environmental costs of each. 1/?

Progress...

What makes this charming passage even more remarkable is exactly how wrong it was proven to be in the next few pages!!

Good to have variety in one's reading material. 🥴

Also known as 'fucking around and finding out!' 🫎

🙄

"A sad soul can kill you quicker, far quicker, than a germ."

So THAT'S where it came from! The phrase has been lodged in my brain for a while, (powerful stuff), but I'm not sure I ever knew the source.

All the seasons, please. 😌🍁🍂❄️

No Planet B.

Called out! 🤦🏼‍♂️

Immediately in love with Charley.

#SundayFunday
@OZMA.OF.OZ

Hands down TRAVELS WITH CHARLEY by John Steinbeck. If you read nothing by him, at least read Part 3, Chapter 6, when Charley encounters bears at Yellowstone Park. Probably the funniest chapter I have ever read. 🤣🤣🤣

Up next: I‘m using this for North America in my Memoir Around The World Challenge and it‘s on my #14books14weeks list. I‘ve seen it on @Amiable favorite book bracket, so I‘m excited to start it!

#bookspinbingo
@TheHeartlandBookFairy (6 of 14)

#firstlinefridays

I don‘t have much to say about this short work. I admired many of Steinbeck‘s perspectives, and I was impressed with some of his insights that seem apt in relation to the historic events since his trip. However, I think high school me would have been more impressed with his writing and found his perspectives new and novel. At time of writing, I felt this was an average, though interesting, travelogue. A lower pick for me. ⬇️

This was a great story of Steinbeck‘s road trip around America. While it dances on the line between fiction and non-fiction, it succeeds beautifully in capturing both the essence of wanderlust and a telling snapshot in time of the US. At times I wished I had read this in print so that I could highlight some of its many memorable passages, but then I would have missed this excellent feat of narration by Gary Sinise. #AuthoraMonth

My March pick for my Nonfiction reading bracket was a no-brainer, despite some fierce competition. I loved this book and will definitely re-read it in the future. Thanks to #AuthorAMonth for pushing it off my TBR and into a favorite.

At 58,#JohnSteinbeck decides to travel across America in a makeshift custom trailer,named Rocinante,to rediscover the America he has been writing about for many years. His companion is his standard poodle,Charley.I loved the relationship with his dog,but I did not love the parts about hunting and traveling with his guns. The most powerful chapters were at the end when he discusses the racism in the South. The time is 1960‘s,but it could be today.

This is the Steinbeck book I read for March's #AuthorAMonth thanks to a very kind gift from @Soubhiville. I enjoyed the book quite a bit. Steinbeck doesn't write about what he finds in America so much as his own story about traveling around America. Overall his POV, as one might expect, is a bit dated. It wasn't bad enough to interfere with the enjoyment of the story. It's a nice, light travelogue. It's a “why not?“ pick for me.

This was a re-read for me, and I‘m happy to say it held up. It‘s astounding to me how many of the same issues are still as relevant now as they were when Steinbeck and Charley traveled in 1960. #AuthorAMonth

I haven't read Steinbeck since high school so went with this nonfiction pick and really enjoyed it! #authoramonth @Soubhiville

I have this thing where I enjoy Steinbeck's writing more than I enjoy his stories, so I thought I would give this one a try, his account of driving a little camper trailer around the country ~1960. First off, this book will definitely make you want to get a little camper trailer and drive it around the country - how fun does that sound??

I overall did enjoy this one, although more in the beginning than towards the end. I liked the scenes where ⬇

I have loved almost every Steinbeck I have read. This was fun, though some of his thoughts would be frowned upon nowadays. I loved his description of Wisconsin, where I live. The audio was read by Gary Sinese.
Thrilled that this was my #bookspin for #AuthorAMonth
@Soubhiville @TheAromaofBooks

Starting my #authoramonth book.

#AAM EXCELLENT audio narration by the talented Gary Sinise❤️‍🔥Steinbeck‘s writing is so vivid and descriptive - and his love for California really shone through these pages. He made want to get in my car and cruise the roads and lanes that snake across the USA. This was a meditative read especially knowing how a few years later the country was to undergo big changes. So grateful to @Soubhiville for choosing this iconic author.

I loved this #AuthorAMonth and #Nonfiction2023 book! It‘s a travelogue of Steinbeck‘s trip across America in 1960 with his dog, Charley. In it he muses about the country‘s shortcomings. He hoped to report that he had found the “truth” about America—but finally understood that no single “truth” can ever be found: that “this mightiest of nations turns out to be the macrocosm of microcosm me.” This book is poignant and lovely and amazingly current.

Reading this Steinbeck account for #authoramonth and came across this #weirdword. I‘m loving it! What say you, @CBee ?

Both of these have been lingering on my TBR shelf for a few years now. Excited to read them both.

#bookspin #doublespin @TheAromaofBooks

WOW! WOW! WOW! Thanks @Soubhiville for the wonderful prize PACKAGE of books for participating in the #AuthorAMonth challenge in 2022. This was WAY more than I was expecting and all perfect books I would have chosen for the 2023 challenge. Such beautiful editions too! I'm looking forward to reading all of these! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! 😊 💖

I'd never read a nonfiction Steinbeck until now. Loved it––but it definitely was fictional and hyperbolic in places. Charley's reaction to the bears of Yellowstone Park is snort-out-loud funniness.

Favorite Quote: “We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip, a trip takes us.“

Happy Labor Day! What are you reading today?

I like to find some short reads that I can finish during a long weekend, so I shared a few of my favorites over on the blog. But today I‘ve been hooked on watching Riverdale, so I probably won‘t get a lot of reading done. I swear that show is addictive.

Blog post: https://wildwoodreads.com/2022/09/02/short-books-for-a-long-weekend/

Hanging out with my reading buddy this evening.

And I officially love this book. Dog? Travel? Americana? Steinbeck? Yes please to all. I loved Charley and have just finished googling pictures of him. And the book, as well as being fantastic writing (of course), is surprisingly relevant now, both in some very prescient statements and in some things that sadly haven't changed enough since the 60s. It's one I'll read again.

Purchased my second ever Folio today from a fabulous second hand book shop.

Book 9

“After all, why should you trust me? A question is a trap and an answer is your foot in it.”

Read this as a teenager. Hooked me for life on Steinbeck,

Thought this might make an interesting book pairing. The second book is Elijah Pierce‘s America.

I reread this favorite on a road trip through Idaho. It was a complete delight to read about the heartland of America while exploring it. His descriptions of wanderlust struck me deeply. I'm grateful I chose to read it while already on the road or I would have been itching to leave. I was disturbed by his experience in the south where he‘s confronted with a sickening amount of racism.

“A sad soul can kill you quicker, far quicker, than a germ.”