Negative On Everything. Straight up, this is the most depressing book I've ever read other than The Road by Cormac McCarthy - which is the singular *worst* book I've ever read. Kendzior's all-encompassing and ever present sense of doom drips from every page, and it is truly exhausting to even read a book that is this utterly bleak. I truly can't imagine living life so utterly despairing - even in my own darkest of times. And this was the reason for one of the star deductions. This tale could have been phenomenal, even transcendental, as a more hopeful look at traveling the US to see its various national parks - and it could have been such even with a pessimistic world view and even with the author's rampant cognitively dissonant political views intact. Simply write with a more hopeful tone than what is presented here!

The other star deduction is the dearth of the bibliography, clocking in at just 7% of the overall text, well short of even the 15% or so I would expect to see in even my more relaxed bibliographical standards of these last couple of years.

For those that see the United States as something to "survive, not thrive" as Kendzior so often notes - even during the Obama and Biden years! - and those that see "women treated as second class citizens, no longer having the same rights as men" (a paraphrase, but not too far off from an exact quote)... you're probably going to think Kendzior a savant here, describing exactly how you feel to a T.

For the rest of us that choose to look on every situation, no matter how bleak, with hope - indeed, particularly for those of us who will *NEVER* see our own political preferences win in any ballot box, given the current state of affairs, yet we fight on for a better future for everyone anyway - this book is going to be one you're going to want to defenestrate early and often.

To be quite honest, had I not accepted this as an Advance Review Copy given the strength of Kendzior's prior work A View From Flyover Country, I would have been right there with you. Had I known how utterly depressing this book would be - obvious in even the first few paragraphs, much less the first chapters - I would have returned it in a heartbeat and never looked back.

As an exemplar of how at least some Americans are feeling and have felt for several years, yes, this book will stand as a time capsule of an era.

But it is also *a* time capsule, and one that will earn its place in the annals of history - if it is remembered that long - for how wrong it is. For how utterly depressing it is, even in a time when America and Americans are more prosperous than literally any generation before them. Things that were science fiction even in my own childhood, just a few scant years behind Kendzior's own, are now science fact. Devices and technologies that Kendzior describes *in this text* as using at various points were barely imaginable in my own childhood, certainly to the level that they both now exist and permeate modern life.

Yes, we absolutely face challenges today, as *all* eras have faced. Denying this is denying reality at least as bad as Kendzior does. But for a book so replete with so much historical data about so many different places, Kendzior seems to miss that many of the very eras she discusses had *just* as many problems. Hell, not only this, Kendzior openly discusses the history of "Blood Island", where politicians and others would go to duel... and yet still decries a heated political rally as a "coup", even when no weapons were present other than in the hands of police.

No, this is a book that will play well with a very particular mindset and a very particular political view... and in all honesty, the only use anyone outside of that mindset and worldview would have to read this text is simply to see this mindset and at least attempt to understand it. Hell, maybe you'll have more success on that point than I have after reading this.

Recommended. Only for certain readers.

I will not be able to finish this book. Although I share the author's political views, I cannot read or listen to them at such great length and with such stridency. Much too depressing for me right now.

Thanks to NetGalley and Flatiron Books for the eARC!

I loved this book. Sarah Kendzior is a gorgeous writer - there were so many sentences that I highlighted - both because they moved me and because the WAY it was said was particularly pleasing or profound.
This is my first Kendzior book, but it definitely won't be my last. I had a bit of familiarity with her because I listened to some of her previous podcast, Gaslit Nation, so her views weren't a surprise to me, except, perhaps, just how much she loves America. I was impressed by how vulnerable she allowed herself to be in writing this.
This is a really unique book - it's more than a memoir, more than a history of America, more than a history of places or people, more than a travel book. It's all of that, and something extra.
I appreciated her sense of urgency to visit places that may not exist in the future - national parks, caves, route 66. Kendzior has a unique way of stirring nostalgia in a reader, even for places they've never been and experiences they've never had.
I think the only thing that would make this book better, was a map (which, of course, I can provide for myself via Google).

My thanks to NetGalley and Flatiron Books for an advance copy of this book dealing with a changing America, how we find ourselves where we are, how this has been happening and my the exceptionalsm that we always thought we had was just a dream.

I grew up in a small town in Connecticut an attended a school that every year up to my graduation always won awards for achievement and excellence. Five years later when my brother graduated, it was barely accredited and under some sort of academic probation, so much so that many feared colleges would hold it against students. Funding from the town, new orders from the state, an 80's government that began hating educating people were to blame. A class I loved American Government went from being required, to being an elective, to omitted. As was Personal Economics, a class that taught about budgets, credit card spending, checks and basic financial information, getting loans, and reading a bank statement. That went away too. I knew that I was not learning the whole story of America, based on my own reading, my father's mutterings while reading papers, and my own observations. However we did learn about checks and balances, and personal checking and finance. We are ignorant in many ways because many are just surviving, and those making it hard to survive, well why should they change. God, Darwin, and hubris are on their side. Everyone wants to be the person's whose boots are licked, that is sadly the American way. Sarah Kendzior has seen this, and been talking about this for a long time, a Cassandra screaming from the bottom of a coal mine, coal which seems more important than recyclable energy to many. When people were thinking how bad America could be in 2016, Kendzior was talking about how much, much, much worse things were going to get. Sadly Kendzior has not been wrong. The Last American Road Trip is a memoir of a lost time, a hope for a better future, and acknowledgement of what has been lost, possibly forever.

Sarah Kendzior has seen the signs for awhile about where the American dream seemed to heading, however for all of Kendzior's forecasting, writings, and television appearances, most of what Kendzior disclosed was ignored. After 2016 Kendzior set on a plan with her husband and children to see America as it was, and maybe see where it was going. For the next few years, using their home state of Missouri as the center, Kendzior and family set out in all the compass points, viewing historical sites, before signs were changed, going to parks before the people working there were fired and getting a sense of America in the midst of birthing pains, and change. Kendzior talked to people both hopeful for change, afraid of change, and some odd ducks. The family learned history, history that might have been hidden or just omitted from the learning tree that is America's educational system. What came across was a realtime viewing of a slow motion car crash, one which is still piling up cars, lives and morals.
I came across Sarah Kendzior when I still watched cable news, and liked the fact that she really didn't sugar coat anything Kendzior said. One could see even seasoned network clones, I mean anchors, losing their demeanor, for Kendzior not following the script, or even making pronouncements that might sound crazy, but even a quite reading of autocracy could prove. I don't remember when I last saw Kendzior on TV, probably for that reason, but the writing still has that impact. Kendzior is a very good writer, and one can feel the passion, the unbelievability that people just don't seem to grasp what is going on. Especially when detailing simple moments with the family. Reading this is like peeking in someone's dream journal, hmm I remember a time like that, but is seems so hazy. So less exhausting.

This is not a feel good book. In fact it makes me happy I don't have children, but I have nephews, and that makes me feel worse. People will one-star the heck out of this book without reading it because it will not feed their world view, one that will stave them out without caring. I recommend this and the graphic novel Dictatorship: It's Easier Than You Think!, as both are important to understanding what is going on now.

The Last American Road Trip: A Memoir by Sarah Kendzior, takes us on a trip through America that most people like me don’t get to experience. Weaving in her family experiences while visiting some of the greatest historical sites in our country, we are emersed in a journey which demonstrates the consistent evolution of American culture and the United States landscape.

While her politics may alienate some readers, listening to this her narration of this book clear demonstrates her love for her country. Her narration style was engaging and very easy to follow. In addition, I received an eARC and Audio for this book and was able to seamlessly switch between the two. I strongly recommend this book for those who love to learn about American History.

Thank you Flatiron Books and NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to and read this book. All Opinions are my own.

Rating: 4 Stars
Audio and Print Pub Date Apr 01 2025

Tags:
@MacmillanAudio
@flatironbooks
#thelastamericanroadtrip
#netgalley

The Last American Road Trip follows journalist Sarah Kendzior and her family as they travel across the U.S. during a period of political upheaval, social chaos, and the pandemic. Driven by a desire to show her young children the America she fears may be vanishing, Kendzior takes them on a series of road trips to explore iconic sites, national parks, and the changing landscape of the country. As she contemplates the decline of democracy and the state of the nation, the book weaves together personal reflections with snapshots of American history and culture, offering a poignant look at a fractured nation.

Review:
While The Last American Road Trip tells a timely story, the disjointed pacing between analysis of personal relationships and scattered bits of American history doesn’t always make for the smoothest read. Still, it's a thought-provoking look at a nation ever in turmoil, seen through the eyes of a mother trying to make sense of it all for her children.

The Last American Road Trip by Sarah Kendzior ⭐⭐⭐ 1/2

Flatiron Books
Pub Date: 4-1-25

Thank you @netgalley and @flatiron_books for this eARC.

"I set out each time from the same place: my home in Missouri, a state in the center of an America that does not hold. I travel with the same people: my husband of twenty years and our two children. We started taking family road trips in 2016, when I felt compelled to show our children the entire United States, in the event of its demise."

Without having read Sarah Kendzior before, the title and description of the book grabbed my attention - "part memoir, party history, and wholly unique".

Just 2.5 weeks from the 2024 US presidential election, I wish I could experience reading this book for the first time - both before and after the election.

Stories of the author's family road trips across America between 2016-2024 are interwoven with historical facts about Mark Twain, Route 66, National Parks, and Caves.

I was hoping for more interaction with others in these stories - a glimpse of the goodness of people met while traveling across the country. Instead, I clung to the author's personal feelings and reflections about her own family, especially her two children and the country she wants for them and their future.

"This is a book about time as much as place and the fragile nature of both. In an era when empathy is demonized, my love for America has come to feel like defiance."

"I still do not take these sights for granted. I keep waiting for a moment when the landscape of America will seem less remarkable, but it has not come. Maybe it is because I travel with children, and when you have children, you view the world through fresh eyes."

#thelastamericanroadtrip #sarahkendzior #flatironbooks #netgalley