- Hardcover: 608 pages
- Publisher: HarperCollins (1 Nov 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0061470902
- ISBN-13: 978-0061470905
- Product Dimensions: 22.6 x 15.5 x 4.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 606,097 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
Review
...a bold and ambitious response by editors Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey....a mix of memoir that holds you and history you didn't know, an open and self-reflective attitude to race and fantastically good writing...If the new American administration is serious about its cultural diplomacy and it use of soft power, it might want to let the rest of the world in on what America looks like from the inside. From the pages of this book it looks funnier, quirkier, smarter, more fragile but more thoughtful and generous-hearted than most of the world has imagined it recently. The state department could do a lot worse than issue every embassy with a box or two of State to State. --David Goldblatt, The Independent, Dec 08<br /><br />It was a good idea of the editors of this volume to embark on a systematic treatment of America at a moment when we are asked to think of the country again as a collection of harmonious but very different voices. Fifty writers, of different levels of distinction some very distinguished indeed have been asked to write about each of the 50 states. Some of them write about their home states, others about states which mean something special to them, one or two merely about a visit to a particular state. There are some exceptionally distinguished writers here among them Dave Eggers, Jayne Anne Phillips, Louise Erdrich, Ann Patchett, Rick Moody, Jonathan Franzen and the wonderful Joshua Ferris, elbowing Carl Hiaasen s reputation out of the way with a brilliant piece on Florida. The book is adorned, too, with some charming statistics, telling you that Tennessee has seven separate State Songs, West Virginia has a toothlessness rate of 40.5 per cent, Kentucky has 2.4 roller-coasters per million head of population, and the difference between the highest and lowest oil consumption per capita is a factor of some 385 per cent, between Alaska and Connecticut. All very fascinating. I might even go there one of these days. --Philip Hensher, The Spectator, Nov 08
'Bold and ambitious ... the tone and technique of this collection are brilliantly varied ... If the new American administration is serious about its cultural diplomacy and its use of soft power, it might want to let the rest of the world in on what America looks like from the inside. From the pages of this book it looks funnier, quirkier, smarter, more fragile but more thoughtful and generous-hearted than most of the world has imagined it until recently.' --The Independent - 12th December 2008
'Bold and ambitious ... the tone and technique of this collection are brilliantly varied ... If the new American administration is serious about its cultural diplomacy and its use of soft power, it might want to let the rest of the world in on what America looks like from the inside. From the pages of this book it looks funnier, quirkier, smarter, more fragile but more thoughtful and generous-hearted than most of the world has imagined it until recently.' --The Independent - 12th December 2008
Review
"[State by State] is a funny, moving, rousing collection, greater than the sum of its excellent parts, a convention of literary superdelegates, each one boisterously nominating his or her piece of the Republic."--New York Times Book Review
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I am sorry but I found this book tedious in the extreme. Considering the authors are supposed to be the cream of the writing community I found almost every one dull, unfunny and boring. As for the stats at the start of each State, the editors should add up the population breakdowns on a calculator as they nearly all added up to over 100 percent, which is impossible. Very disappointing.
Format:Kindle Edition
Maybe it's me ... but I suspect that - without knowing what this book is REALLY about - you might fall into the same trap I did. I wanted a state by state account of interesting facts... and something about the heart and soul of each state. In essence - what each state is like - andwhat the people are like. Buy the book and all you really get are pages ( and tedious pages ) of people who have been given the opportunity to ' grandstand ' and write ( sadly, most of them can't ) and what do they do with this chance to get into print ? Well, for the most part they simply ramble on about themselves - their wives - kids - families and girlfriends. Every once in a while.. they just might just mention something about the state in which they live. If you are after the - facts - and about what each state is like .... stay away from this book - it just doesn't do... what I suspect you REALLY wanted it to do. On the other hand - you might enjoy reading about all the domestic twaddle in these folk's lives - and for your money... you won't get much else. It's a bummer.
7 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This is a useful reference book about each of the 50 states in the union by journalists and novelists who lived in these states. I enjoyed Cristina Henriquez's interesting account of Texas, and Jhampa Lahiri's essay on Rhode Island. Jonathan Franzen describes an imaginary interview with the state of New York, which is outlandish. Essays on South Dakota and Michigan could have been better.
I lived in several states that includes; Massachusetts, California, Colorado, New Jersey, North Carolina and West Virginia, I thought the authors could have provided a little more info about these states. There are some interesting facts and figures given at the end of the book; cigarette consumption, breastfeeding rate (as if someone is interested in this statistics!), suicide rate, toothlessness (how amazing for authors to find a statistics about this!), military enlistment, etc.
1. Rand Mcnally Road Atlas: USA, Canada, Mexico (Rand McNally Road Atlas)
2. Big Road Atlas USA (AA Atlases and Maps) (AA Atlases and Maps)
3. State-By-State Atlas
I lived in several states that includes; Massachusetts, California, Colorado, New Jersey, North Carolina and West Virginia, I thought the authors could have provided a little more info about these states. There are some interesting facts and figures given at the end of the book; cigarette consumption, breastfeeding rate (as if someone is interested in this statistics!), suicide rate, toothlessness (how amazing for authors to find a statistics about this!), military enlistment, etc.
1. Rand Mcnally Road Atlas: USA, Canada, Mexico (Rand McNally Road Atlas)
2. Big Road Atlas USA (AA Atlases and Maps) (AA Atlases and Maps)
3. State-By-State Atlas
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
