I am very conflicted about driving. I drive a bookmobile for a living, which I consider to be a great service, bringing library resources to underserved communities. In my personal life, however, I am a conscientious objector from the fossil fuel industry, and I have not owned a car for many years, instead relying on public transportation and my feet to get around. I love the act of driving, but I hate the environmental and geopolitical catastrophe that car culture has wrought.

I was drawn to this book because driving is an issue on which I'm already of two minds, and because I'd read and loved "Shop Class as Soulcraft." For those who have read Crawford's other work, this book definitely does not disappoint. As you may expect, there's a healthy dose of machismo and a dollop of glorifying the underdog. It may be because the perspective is so wildly different from almost everything else I read, but I find it captivating and couldn't put the book down.

Thoughtful, playful, at times glib and often daring, Crawford's prose is extremely readable. Thematically I would compare this text to Roland Barthes' "What is Sport," but far less academic in tone. Not unlike a meandering drive, I saw a lot I didn't expect to see and ended up in places without remembering how I'd gotten there, so lulled by the smoothness of the ride. I learned about obscure automotive enthusiast subcultures and the philosophy of human agency. A really entertaining and thought provoking read.

I have always felt most at peace with myself during long, solitary, cross-country road trips, a fact that puzzles more than few of my friends and always made my mother a little uptight. So, when I read the description for Why We Drive by Matthew B. Crawford, I felt I'd found a kindred spirit. After reading the book, I'm not sure I did.

Maybe it was about my expectations, or maybe my hopes. I wanted a book that celebrated driving - the freedom, the headspace, the emotional release of getting behind a car and determining your course and timeline and experience. Why We Drive was not that book. Instead, it was a well-written personal essay on why self-driving cars and car-sharing are bad and how car-less and car-hating Americans are ruining it for the rest of us.

I was not a fan, and admit to skimming through much of the book hoping to find something that hooked me in.

For car enthusiasts - as opposed to folks like me who simply like the feel of the open road - Why We Drive would probably be a satisfying read. There's a lot of information about how car safety advocates and environmentalists have changed cars and this the driving experience in general which is interesting, and the author's personal commentary of various cars he's owned or driven definitely adds a friendly counterpart to the more technical information. The writing is clear, the research seemingly thorough and used appropriately to move the story forward, and the author's voice is consistent and engaging.

Overall, I think my lack of enthusiasm for this book is based almost entirely on my own false expectations. I expected one kind of book and read a different kind. And that happens. Still, I walked away with a deeper understanding of the auto industry's move toward automated, driver-less cars and how that will change us all.