I love a good road book, and Travels with Charlie is no exception. Every writer who does a travel book ultimately presents more of themselves than the people and places they experience, both because they know themselves better, and because the experiences of the road becomes a mirror to reveal the traveler. Steinbeck’s book does this more than most — it gives you far more Steinbeck than America. The few encounters he described along the way became devices to allow him to pontificate and philosophize.

Not that this is a problem. Spending time with Steinbeck is a pleasure. His sharp mind, slightly world-weary humor, and philosophical take on America as he found it in the Fall of 1960 all combine for a fascinating literary journey.

In these pages, Steinbeck tells us much about himself, including a physical description:

”I wear a beard and mustache but shave my cheeks. I cultivate this beard not for usual given reasons of skin trouble or pain of shaving, nor for the secret purpose of covering a weak chin, but as pure, unblushing decoration, much as a peacock finds pleasure in his tail. And finally, in our time, a beard is the one thing a woman cannot do better than a man.”

He shares the profundities of people he met, like these musings from a rugged Maine Yankee:

”My grandfather knew the number of whiskers in the All Mighty’s beard. I don’t even know what happened yesterday, let alone tomorrow. He knew what it was that makes a rock or a table, I don’t even understand the formula that says nobody knows.”

And, of course, Steinbeck used his brilliant wordsmithing to give us scintillating details of the areas he traversed:

”Montana seems to me to be what a small boy would think Texas is like from hearing Texans.”

Keep in mind that Travels with Charlie isn’t wholly non-fiction. At best, this book is creative non-fiction — a creative story shaped and inspired by Steinbeck’s travels rather than a fully accurate recreation of the actual trip. But with a novelist as great as John Steinbeck, who’s complaining?

I read the Steinbeck trifecta in junior high and highschool - The Red Pony, Of Mice and Men, and The Grapes of Wrath. Since that time, graduating 20 years ago, I have not read Steinbeck again. I bought this book to read on a train trip I had planned in California, since I knew that Steinbeck's father was a train man and that he grew up in California. Since that trip was cancelled the book has lingered on my shelf at home, long enough for me to forget I had it. So when the audio version of the book came up on a BOGO sale in Audible, narrated by Gary Sinise, I bought it without checking. Ah well, the audio was great. The book will be nice to refer back to. Win/win.

Steinbeck reminds me of Orwell in his non-fiction writing. Talking to individuals and writing about their experiences, focusing on people in rural areas living their everyday lives. He is traveling the country with his dog Charley in 1960, from Maine to Wisconsin to Oregon to California to Texas to the south. The world is getting ready to change and there is this feeling of the "last times" of whatever we can call the years before the president and MLK Jr are assassinated, before the Civil Rights Movement. The chapters in the south are particularly insightful and painful to read.

A few broad comments on travel that I liked:

"I felt at last that my journey had started; I think I hadn't really believed in it before."

"We know so little of our own geography." (Maine)

"It is possible, even probable, to be told a truth about a place, to accept it, to know it, and at the same time, to not know anything about it... Why then was I unprepared for the beauty of this region?" (Wisconsin)

"For all of our enormous geographic range, for all of our sectionalism... we are a nation."

I need to read more Steinbeck. Between his literature classics everyone studies in school and his non-fiction works like this one, he wrote several novels that I have never read. The main one I think of is East of Eden, which I also have bought and left on a shelf. I used to think I disliked him, but what I disliked as a child are traits that make me appreciate him now. His descriptiveness, his straightforward nature, his tone. I was jarred by it at age 12. I didn't realize that was a sign of growth.

This work is a very different story from the other Steinbeck books I have read so far (Of Mice and Men, The Pearl). It is another genre our author is tackling here. It is no longer a matter of fiction in which many elements are linked to his life, but rather his daily life—a daily in a particular context, of course, but a daily all the same.
I like travel reports, especially for their hectic and unexpected things. The pace here is a bit slower than I expected at the start. But let's put it in context: this isn't about many raving youngsters going on an adventure to accomplish the 400 moves. This travel is the quiet journey of a man who is no longer very young and does not go on an adventure but to meet his contemporary fellow citizens to understand them better.

My father and I only agreed on two things: my mother was a saint, and Barry Goldwater was evil.

Steinbeck can do no wrong in my eyes

You know how the heroes of westerns and comic books and adventures are always good men? My dad likes that kind of story where the moral is, "nothing is better than a good man!" He is the type that thinks a "man" just lives the best way he can! He loves legends and spooky tales and always made himself the hero. He told us, my friends and me, that he once saved his whole platoon by jumping on a grenade, and we believed him, though he never served in the military.

So how can I not give five stars to the memoir that includes Steinbeck's own words, "There's nothing better than a good man." How, goodreaders? And I finished reading it while being driven home from my dad's brother's funeral. I found out family secrets on that trip, like I always do, but despite the tragedy list that has stacked up in that family, my dad is under the impression that his life has been pretty easy and that most people are good and that god provides if you work hard. And Steinbeck has this optimism (though it's admittedly more guarded and intelligent), and we don't just have to infer that through his characters. In this book, it's himself!

This book may cause some to get a jolt of wanderlust, but I felt a little of the opposite when he went back to his hometown of Monterey on the trip, and sat in a bar with his aging amigos and tried to convince them that you can't go home. Is that true? If you can't go home, then I kind of don't want to leave.

Right now I wish I could have lived a while back and could somehow marry John Steinbeck, but this seems weird to mention after talking about my dad so much. Don't get all Freudian interprety, please. For now, I'll just keep reading, reading, reading his books. Next is Grapes of Wrath.

4 to 4.5 stars

It seems like lately I have been reading a lot of books about road trips. This is just fine with me as I love the open road! Getting some perspective on others' experiences on the highway combines road trips with my other favorite hobby . . . reading, of course!

Travels With Charlie is mid 20th century America in the words of one of the most American authors that ever was. Just a truck, a dog, and the open road. It is poetic and beautiful. It is dark and mysterious. It funny and infuriating. Don't go in expecting a smooth ride, because 1960s America was full of pot holes and speed traps!

Steinbeck is viewing post WWII America before new technology takes over and shrinks the country down. When each region still each had a strong unique mystique of their own. Where prejudices still ran high in some places if you were not a local or not the right color (and, yes, I know this is still an issue today, but what Steinbeck describes is extreme). And when vending machines at rest stops could still blow Steinbeck's mind as the most cutting edge retail technology. He pulls no punches when it comes to telling the reader how much he loved or loathed his experiences. Because of this, some people may have a hard time reading this without getting upset.

I think works like this are so important. We have plenty of books preserving information on major historical events, but day to day life needs it's time in the sun as well. To be able to read something like this about life in my country around the time my parents were teenagers has the potential to impact me a lot more than learning about the major news events of the time period. I am not sure how much an impact this book might have on non-Americans, but I think everyone who grew up in the United States will be captivated.

3.5 Stars

A slow start but finished strong, this is a wonderful snapshot of America in the 1960s through the eyes of a famous author and his cantankerous dog.

I did mildly lose interest in the beginning and was wondering its focus until it got to the section in California. That's where I really invested in the story and understood its powerful and influence. I wish it was as strong as the last 60-70 pages throughout but it was what it is. I loved what it said about home and change and find its musings on those subjects the strongest in the book.

I have a soft spot for books that are love letters to one's country or city and I felt that this was a true love letter to America from one of America's most famous literary products.

#JohnandCharley4Eva

I read this book in my youth 50 years ago and remembered nothing (no surprise, since I forget books I read last week) except that I loved it. So I thought I'd try it again.

The trip was as much his inner musings as his travel experiences, which was fine. His details about places and people were rich and interesting, though I yearned for more. His comments on the urban/suburban sprawl were an interesting history from 1960 and could have been written today, except that it's much worse now.

Throughout the book, I vacillated between 4 stars and 5, but the latter part in New Orleans was so engaging, I landed on 5 stars. New Orleans is an important city to me as my grandmother was a light-skinned mullatto in that city, born and raised. But she left in the 1920s and passed for white, so she had no experience with the civil rights movement. Still, the city is part of my roots and close to my heart, and what he witnessed there in 1960 was disturbing.

I really felt the ending when his trip was done and he was still not home... I know that feeling of burnout from my own long trips, and really felt his eagerness for home. And I enjoyed the humor he left the reader with.

Very recommended!

"Travels with Charley: In Search of America" by John Steinbeck is a travelogue of his 1960 camping trip across America!

This is my last read and review of 2021! It's also the December '21 selection for the community book club I belong to and I'm so glad we picked it. It was the perfect book for a great end of year discussion!

John Steinbeck! Yes, that is a complete sentence. He's an author who writes stories about our country and its people, but at the age of fifty-eight, he felt he had lost touch with what he writes about and wanted to experience America and its people first hand.

There is debate over this book being non-fiction versus fiction, that Mr. Steinbeck did not travel and camp across America with his pooch. But, let's face it, this man is a novelist. He's creative, he imagines, he makes stories up, that's what he does. So why is it so shocking that this trek across America didn't actually happen?

To me, it doesn't matter. I don't feel snookered, it makes me smile. This story is creative and I was enthralled and entertained by each chapter. A book written by John Steinbeck, traveling America in his truck with a camper top and his dog by his side, talking to the 'folks' he met along the way, what's not to love?

What I discovered while listening to this audiobook was how much Mr. Steinbeck cared about our county, the people, and how in touch he was with what was happening during the 1960's and how insightful he was about our future. He spoke of the environment, loss of regional differences and uniqueness throughout our country. As a lifelong observer, he clearly understood the progression of things to come.

John Steinbeck is driving, I'm a passenger with Charley between us. He's sharing his thoughts, I'm listening and fascinated while Charley, his standard poodle, sleeps most of the way and most likely takes up most of the seat! The audiobook felt that real and was expertly narrated by Gary Sinise.

After I finished listening it occurred to me that perhaps John Steinbeck wasn't 'in search of America' as much as he was searching for himself. It is said that he was depressed, in poor health and you can feel the low points in his writing, especially towards the end.

This book was published in 1962 the same year he won a Nobel Prize for Literature. Sadly, John Steinbeck died of heart failure in 1968 at the age of sixty-six.

It's exciting to end 2021 on such a high note with a 5 star read! I highly recommend this creative and entertaining book!

What is there not to love about a travelogue featuring John Steinbeck and his French poodle Charley? Look at them, they're best friends:



And check out the awesome Rocinante (named after Don Quixote's horse), a custom-made camper truck that carried them around America:



This is the route they took that I'd love to retrace someday:

Closer to 3.5 stars. Steinbeck's writing is immaculate as always and it is amazing how many of his observations are still true today.

Watch my discuss it in my November wrap up part 1: https://youtu.be/lC4fAH-_itc