shock and awe seem appropriate

Journey to Nowhere: The Saga of the New Underclass by Dale Maharidge
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Having just finished this amazingly written and illustrated book, the words shock and awe seem appropriate to describe how it has impressed me. The writing and the photography in this book are excellent, top notch. It is no wonder that these authors went on to win a Pulitzer for the third in this series of journalistic volumes. I read this because it is a book that deeply impressed and inspired Bruce Springsteen as he was working on his masterpiece album "The Ghost of Tom Joad". Both Bruce's album and this book draw from John Steinbeck's classic "The Grapes of Wrath". What i did not realize is that the desperate conditions that were experienced in the Great Depression by both Steinbeck's Joad family and my ancestors are still at work today. For various economic and political reasons, hard working people are falling victim to circumstance and are being discarded from our society like disposable plates and napkins. These people, who have done everything right are finding themselves sliding off the margins of our communities into a dystopian nightmare of life and death survival. We read the stories of the depression with the distance of time keeping it at arms length from us, but in reality, the desperation continues into present day, and is getting worse. More and more blue collar and even white collar workers are falling off the grid of humanity through no fault of their own, only to find themselves fighting to stay alive until they are rescued, or until they run out of steam and are lost forever. This book portrays the horrific situations in a most beautifully written and photographed manner. As terrible as the subject matter is, just as wonderful is the way in which it is presented. This is a must read. I cannot wait to get my hands on the two follow on books in this series, the third of which won a Pulitzer prize. Excellent book. Outstanding!


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