I don't quite know what I was expecting. It is likely insight that I was seeking. I do not get a long with rural people. I have lived in rural areas and they have vastly different priorities than I do. After 5 years in a rural neighborhood, which was known as a high income area for some reason, I bought a home in the city and moved. I am just not a rugged individualist and I like sidewalks, libraries, and nearby schools. And my former neighbors valued large truck, boats, and four wheelers. They eat different things than I do. They have different hobbies. They do not like college and reading books, generally. They will be sad as the rural areas disappear. I will miss farms and open spaces, but not like they will miss their whole thing. I want to make my city more walkable and they want to have even bigger trucks in wider driveways. I want more parks and accessibility and they want to go four wheeling.
Anyway. none of that has anything to do with the book, that is just why I read it.
I need to work on understanding these people and having compassion for them. I will be honest though. The book helped with some understanding but it did not help me with compassion.

The book feels too long to be honest. I need a shorter version.
Great research! Great job!

I didn't love this one but I also didn't hate this one. However I'm not sure how I feel about this one. But I also don't regret reading it.

I think we all want to know more about the rural voter either because we long for that lifestyle ourselves, or we want to know what the heck they are thinking when they cast their votes for someone so distant from their way of life. We need to know so hopefully we can get this country back on track. So, that's why I wanted to read this.
But this book has a bit of an identity crisis going on. It's lengthy and filled with research, tables, statistics etc. It's a bit much for someone who just wants to get to the meat of the issue. Yet, it's very readable and has a tone that non-academics can appreciate. So, who is this book for? In attempting to reach a range of audiences, the book ties itself up in a few knots. The reader starts to skim....

Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of this book. I have found some of it to be quite fascinating!

Intriguing Investigation Marred by Academic Elitism. A disclosure up front: as I get into the meat of this review momentarily, know that I am literally a man with "R == R" tattooed on his arm, which reads "Real is Real" for those less familiar with mathematics and C-family programming, and -for those less familiar with the work in question- it is the actual subheading for Part III of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.

Now, as to the actual text at hand for this review: It really was quite remarkable. Don't let the three star rating fool you: this is a book that you *need* to read if you hope to have any remotely accurate understanding of politics in the United States, as it is the singular best book I've found to date on just what makes its titular subject a truly distinct class. In likely north of 90% of the time, I can tell you straight up that no matter what you *think* the rural voter is or how you *think* they vote or what you *think* they value... you're more than likely wrong. Read this book to set your facts straight, and proceed from there as you will.

Now, as to the star deductions: The first is fairly standard for me, though some readers may have less of a problem with it. Quite simply, I expect any nonfiction book to be well documented, and by that I mean at least approaching the 20-30% mark (which is the typical average in my experience, though as some other reviews this year have noted, I'm slowly getting less stringent on that as long as the book in question is at least close to that number). However, this book had barely half of the bottom edge of the range, clocking in at just around 11% of the text. So there's the first star deduction, one I knew of before I ever read a word of this text.

The second star deduction is likely given away by the "Marred By Academic Elitism" part of the title of this review. Indeed, while the authors both note that they actively live in rural America and work at a small college, their active partisanship is rather blatant and even openly embraced - and of the typical sort most would expect from Academia. Indeed, one reason I didn't deduct *two* stars here - yes, some would say the elitism and partisanship are *that* heavy handed, certainly at times - was because even as the authors wanted *Democrats* to become more active with rural voters (and yes, they specifically noted exactly that multiple times, particularly later in the text), they also openly noted that more people *generally* need to get more active with rural voters and allow those voters the active choice in candidates and policies to support or oppose, rather than simply allowing national politics to take the fore unopposed. As a two time rural/ suburban small town City Council candidate myself... that was actually *the* message I centered both of my campaigns around - that the People would have a direct choice. (For those who care, if any, I lost both races roughly 75%-25%, though the second race was a Special Election and yet had higher turnout than the first, a General Election. So I consider that fact alone a moral win. :D)

But truly, even if you don't agree with the authors' heavy handed elitist partisanship - read this book anyway. They really do show quite a bit of solid research that you need to understand if you expect to play well in rural America generally, and even if you grew up in the town/ region you're hoping to win an election it... this research may show even you things about the rural voter more generally that likely apply to even your specific rural voters. It will certainly be worth your effort to read and decide for yourself.

Which brings me to another class of reader, as someone who was *also* a former Party Leader (having served as both the local affiliate Chair of my local Libertarian Party as well as on the Libertarian Party of Georgia's State Executive Committee as both a member and an appointee): Party Leadership, and particularly those in *any* US Political Party (to be clear, any organization that considers itself such, regardless of State election laws) who are responsible for candidate training and education, or even overall Party outreach or strategy. In any of those cases and in any of those Parties, you need to read this book. (And for those unaware, there actually are literally upwards of 100 such organizations with ballot access in at least one State across the United States, though only the Green Party and Libertarian Party have threatened - or achieved - enough ballot access to *theoretically* win the Presidency this Millennium.)

Overall a solid, if flawed, text, and very much recommended.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC!

I appreciate the scholars’ views on this topic and think this book provides an interesting take on a long discussed issue among pundits and politicos.

As someone who grew up in an area that bordered suburban and rural, I am always hesitant to hear scholars and pundits discuss what motivates rural voters (or southern voters, or lower middle class voters) assuming they may well get it wrong in my view as someone who lived it. But I think the scholars here did get it right in the ideas they developed. There is definitely a sense that a way of life is at risk and that does drive voter behavior.