Finding Abbey: The Search for Edward Abbey and His Hidden Desert Grave

by Sean Prentiss

When the great environmental writer Edward Abbey died in 1989, four of his friends buried him secretly in a hidden desert spot that no one would ever find. The final resting place of the Thoreau of the American West remains unknown and has become part of American folklore. In this book a young writer who went looking for Abbey's grave combines an account of his quest with a creative biography of Abbey.

Sean Prentiss takes readers across the country as he gathers clues from his research, travel, and interviews with some of Abbey's closest friends--including Jack Loeffler, Ken "Seldom Seen" Sleight, David Petersen, and Doug Peacock. Along the way, Prentiss examines his own sense of rootlessness as he attempts to unravel Abbey's complicated legacy, raising larger questions about the meaning of place and home.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Nature, Memoir, Travel, Outdoors, Westerns

240 pages, Paperback

First published March 5, 2015

About the author

Sean Prentiss is the author of Finding Abbey: A Search for Edward Abbey and His Hidden Desert Grave, which won the National Outdoor Book Award. He is also the author of Crosscut: Poems. He is the co-editor of two anthologies about creative nonfiction, The Science of Story and The Far Edges of the Fourth Genre. He is the co-author of Environmental and Nature Writer: A Writer's Guide and Anthology. Forthcoming is Advanced Creative Nonfiction: A Writer's Guide and Anthology.

Reviews

[Ron S · Rating 2 out of 5]

Those interested in Abbey will be drawn to this book for any nuggets of information and additions to the canon of an author sorely missed. Interviews with some of Abbey's closest friends that have survived him, like David Petersen, Doug Peacock and Ken Sleight are the highlights of this book. Of much less interest, are the author's repetitive refrains about the dissatisfaction he feels with his job and life in the city, and what feels like an all consuming need for the reader, and perhaps himself, that has something in common with Abbey. Well before I'd finished the book I was screaming at him "well then quit your damn job and move to the damn mountains then but shaddup about it will you?!" The final few chapters are telegraphed so clearly ahead that instead of surprise, I only felt joy for the journey having ended, its predictable conclusion reached. Worth reading for the interviews, I'd skip the rest.

[Colleen Dempsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this for its sentiments on love of the wild and the west and its wonderings on environmental activism. I’ve read probably no more than 20 pages of Abbey’s Desert Solitaire, but appreciated the way prentiss questions abbey’s opinions on immigration, race etc and didn’t just idolize him. Felt very kindred with prentiss for his musings on living in the midwest and missing the outdoors.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

worth reading for the interviews with abbey's friends, not so much for the rest. if I wanted to read a dissatisfied white guy languish on about the real meaning of nature I would... well, read ed abbey. there's a lot of space to think about what it means to wrestle with ed's legacy but this book doesn't do anything new for me. oh well.

[Mitch · Rating 5 out of 5]

A magical tale

Prentiss spins a magical tale of searching for a dream, and chasing after the ghost of a legend. His search carries him deep into the desert, as well as deep into his own soul.

[Sandy Brown Jensen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Author Sean Prentiss put in thousand sof miles making interview connections and visiting old Ed Abbey haunts while researching Finding Abbey. Author Sean Prentiss put in thousands of miles making interview connections and visiting old Ed Abbey haunts while researching Finding Abbey.
It took me a while to warm up to Finding Abbey: The Search for Edward Abbey and His Hidden Desert Grave‘s thesis and its narrator, Sean Prentiss. I told myself I’d give it until page fifty, and that turned out to be plenty of time to get a handle on what Prentiss was up to.

I definitely finished–who wouldn’t want to find a hidden desert grave?

But let me back up a moment and say how this book came into my hands in the first place. My husband and I were on an extended Southwest road trip earlier this year and fetched up in Moab, Utah in the Back of the Beyond Bookstore. A friend, Susan Carkin, texted me at that moment to remind me I was in Abbey Country and to look for his ghost.

I bought a copy of Desert Solitaire and this book Finding Abbey: The Search for Edward Abbey and His Hidden Desert Grave, which actually turned out to be the more interesting of the two. (Ahem. At least, it is the one I finished.)

I knew who Ed Abbey was, of course, at least as a culture hero to the radical environmental left. I could have told you he was a writer who celebrated the Southwest landscape (Desert Solitaire) and an environmentalist who coined the term “monkeywrenching” (The Monkey Wrench Gang) for nonviolent sabotage against ecological exploiters, and whose efforts to organize the radical left inspired the formation of Earth First! It was his generation that tried and failed to save the flooding of Glen Canyon, the current Lake Powell–or Lake Foul, as Abbey and his cronies call it.

I’d tried reading his books before, but I just can’t seem to finish one. So Sean Prentiss did me a service in Finding Abbey by thoroughly filling me in on as much Abbey lore as I’ll ever need to know.

I must say Prentiss is the master of the compare/contrast paragraph. Using it as a literary device, he wants to associate himself with Abbey, so there are frequent pauses to underscore these perceived likenesses. Here is a short example:

“In his introduction to The Journey Home, Abbey called himself ‘one who lives and loves by choice far out on the very verge of things, on the edge of the abyss, where this world falls off into the depths of another.’ And that, too, seems where I best like to be. I’d rather camp alone at Sleeping Bear Dunes than go to some downtown bar. I’d rather build a cabin on a quiet mountain than own a house in the suburbs. Places feel most like home when they are closest to being beyond.”

“Abbey is like this; I am like that, too,” is a repeating paragraph structure in this book, and it isn’t a terrible way to keep an organizing principle on track, even if turns out in the end, not to be very true at all. The more I learned about each of the two men, the less convincing the comparison became. I came away with the impression of Abbey as an alcoholic womanizer, who had a gift for male bonding and who spent his writing life pushing back against the encroaching forces of civilization.

Kind of a jerk with something important to say, but not a guy I personally would have wanted to meet.

Prentiss, on the other hand, strikes me as a much more integrated and successful human being. He has a healthy sense of adventure, although he does really stupid things like hike in the desert, deliberately leaving water behind (60). What was that all about? Surely not machismo? Or misplaced Romanticism? It reminded me of the opening scene in Wild where Cheryl Strayed loses a hiking boot down a cliff. Born and raised within spittin’ distance of the Pacific Crest Trail, my siblings and I thought her too dumb to live, and none of us would read the book.

Having passed that oddity, I moved on to appreciate that Prentiss is a methodical writer (unlike Abbey, who seems unfocused, an emotional jumble), and, in spite of his efforts to identify with the dubious Abbey, is obviously a lot better adjusted to the 21st century than Abbey ever was to the 20th.

In my way of thinking, character is everything, and in the long run of this book, Prentiss, I think, inadvertently reveals himself to have a lot more character and a stronger moral compass than Abbey. But I get it that being around Abbey was like having a baby, a dog, or a wild animal in the room: nobody could take their eyes off him because they never knew what he was going to do or say next.

On my mental bookshelf, Finding Abbey goes right beside Azar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran because both authors so closely juxtapose a text and an author to their own quotidian life. I’ll say this for Prentiss–he never takes his eye off the wild animal in the room.

However, on the way to finding both Abbey and his grave, Prentiss does a lot of good mental wandering and wondering about the mythos of the American West, as well as the value of mystery, the value of a journey, and the value of a home. Prentiss muses, “I need to think of success not as finding this grave or even finding the answer but as searching for answers even if I never come to any singular conclusion. I have to believe that there might never be a final answer….Having a crazy idea, a wild idea, and then journeying toward that idea–that is home” (211).

And it is this journey, the searching for the grave, for Abbey’s ghost, for the West, for personal answers to questions of loneliness and the imperative to work for a living instead of spending a life wandering in the wilderness that provides the forward momentum of the book.

The object of this mystery adventure is to find Abbey’s hidden desert grave, and the quadrants are anchored with four outstanding interviews with Abbey’s closest friends: Jack Loeffler (Adventures with Ed), David Petersen (On the Wild Edge: In Search of a Natural Life), Ken Sleight (“The Original Monkey Wrencher”), and Doug Peacock (Grizzly Years: In Search of the American Wilderness). Each of the men is a force to be reckoned with in his own right.

Okay, I will admit to some freefloating uneasiness that came and went in this book, specifically around issues of alcoholism and racism.

Abbey (1929-1989) and all his buddies were, in my humble opinion, victims of 1950s-60s advertising. They appear to have been walking beer can ads, men who saw and instantly believed in the Marlboro man, as well. I think we can safely stir John Wayne and other nail chewing Western movie tropes into the mix. In spite of their proven tough-guy environmental ecotage consciences, not one seems to have had the self-awareness to peel back the myth of MAN AS DRINKER.

To be hypermasculine, they seemed to need alcohol and lots of it.

I’m sorry to say that Prentiss seems to want to add his name to the rosters of “I am Man, watch me drink!” However, his efforts to show that he is a hard drinker “just like Abbey” just seem sad and so last century.

In the context of this book, Prentiss regals us with his beer brands of choice; primarily Miller Lite. Were there NO microbrews marketing decent beer nationally circa 2010? Of course he could get good beer anywhere–why Miller Lite?

ProfPrentissMiller Lite is not my idea of a masculinity marker; maybe a class marker of some sort but out of sync with Prentiss’s portrayal of himself as a temporarily loose cannon professor looking for a home. (Image: Luke Hotwagner)
Another source of uneasiness and no doubt a major reason why Abbey’s cult following has waned over the last double decade is his clearly racist attitudes toward all immigrants and Mexicans specifically. Prentiss quotes Abbey in his book The Journey Home as muttering about the “sullen and hostile Indians, all on welfare” (50). In One Life At a Time, Please, Abbey said, “It might be wise for us as American citizens to consider calling a halt to the mass influx of even more millions of hungry, ignorant, unskilled, and culturally-morally-genetically impoverished people” (50).

Prentiss handles this topic with kid gloves, and much more deftly than he does Abbey’s alcoholism because he is being more careful not to associate himself with it. He quotes Abbey, sets the quotes best he can in context and while not excusing or explaining away, tries to show that “Abbey’s view of land was …lacking in complexity. He wanted land fenced off, untouched by humans” (50), including excluding Indians and Mexicans. Abbey’s concern was the land, and he decried all sources of overpopulation and defilement, including both natives and immigrants. Abbey wanted a wall along the border, which is not the quickest way to attract new young readers.

Prentiss circles back around to this topic at the end of the book when he and his buddy Haus are wandering around the Cabeza Prieta Desert actually looking for Abbey’s grave. They come across evidence of illegal Mexican immigrants, who would have had to cross forty or fifty miles of desert on foot. Haus says, “Think of the people who make this trip from Mexico. And it’s not just smugglers or narco-mules or twenty-five-year-old men who do this trip. It’s fifty-year-old women….Teen mothers with children in their arms. Too often environmental literature distorts the true heroes of these landscapes. It’s not men on backpacking trips” (183).

Do Prentiss and Haus actually find Abbey’s grave? I am not one to ruin the mystery.

This is not a book that includes women, but I don’t have a problem with that. It’s about what it means to be a certain kind of human. Abbey is one, but his four famous friends–Peacock, Loeffler, Sleight, and Petersen– each have their own twist on what it means to be a male of that generation in that activist culture, too. Prentiss’s interviews showcase each of the four strong personalities who have gone about the business of becoming more themselves in different ways. I think the loss of the Glen Canyon fight threw a shadow over all their lives, making them both more ironic and more bitter (it would me, anyway). They are all more similar to Abbey and to each other being old school desert rats and radicals than to the quieter and more scholarly Sean Prentiss.

Prentiss put his rugged he-man time into the Southwest, but he is firmly and clearly a man of the 21st century.Prentiss put his rugged he-man time into the Southwest, but he is firmly and clearly a man of the 21st century. (Image: Tim Calkins)
Prentiss knows enough to honor his elders, and this book is that homage. But, in the end, he meets the right woman, gets the right job, and settles down to root himself to a piece of Vermont real estate. Nothing like Abbey at all.

But for God’s sake, could someone pass him a decent beer?

From my book review website: http://www.booksmyfriendshavewritten....

[Myles · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you're a big Abbey fan, this book is worth reading for the interviews of his friends. There are also some really nice descriptions of deserts around the southwest, especially Arizona which I enjoyed. The drag on this book is the author's frequent self searching moments and relating his understanding of Abbey's writing to what he is going through in life. While it is genuine, it is also a bit of a tired trope that this book's primary audience (probably men who went through an Abbey phase in their twenties) will instantly understand and not need to be guided through.

[Daniel Abbott · Rating 5 out of 5]

“The American frontier is not just a physical frontier, not just unexplored spots on maps; it’s the places of mystery populating the American mind.”--Sean Prentiss, Finding Abbey: The Search for Edward Abbey and His Hidden Desert Grave

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Because I find Edward Abbey such an intriguing character, I was excited to find Finding Abbey: The Search for Edward Abbey and His Hidden Desert Grave by Sean Prentiss. However, in many ways, this title is a bit misleading, as Prentiss isn't really just looking for Abbey's grave -- he is looking to find out more about the elusive figure of Abbey himself and indeed, find answers about his own life.

Prentiss starts his journey in Home, Pennsylvania, looking for the graves of Abbey's family. It's a discouraging start: the village itself is nearly deserted and those he does stop to talk to (including a teenager who works at the local ice cream shop and a local pastor) have never heard of Edward Abbey. Eventually, however, he does find the lonely graveyard. With a friend, Prentiss studies the site: "We stand in front of the Abbey family grave, both knowing this piece of granite means nothing to the larger world. Abbey isn't buried here, and he probably only stood here once, to put his mother Mildred to rest back in November 1988."

Still, this lonely cemetery marks a sound start to Prentiss's journey which takes him across the United States through various places where Abbey once lived. During this journey, Prentiss interviews a few of Abbey's friends, including Doug Peacock, the man who has been described as the real life model for the character of George Washington Hayduke in what is probably considered Abbey's most famous novel, The Monkey Wrench Gang. It's on this journey that Prentiss starts to take stock of his own life: "What matters is that I listened to Abbey's friends. It's about seeing the desert through their eyes. Questioning Abbey through his writings, probing further into why he felt the way he did toward women, minorities, and immigration. Revitalizing my political self through his books and his friends' words. Questioning my life--how and where to find a place called home."

Part memoir, part travelogue, part biography, Finding Abbey is a book that not only explores the life of an elusive literary figure, but also catalogs a young writer's own self discovery. Prentiss discovers that it doesn't really matter whether or not he finds Abbey's grave -- in the end, he finds out what he really wants to know.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enjoyable and easy read.

He travels through several really great places in Colorado, Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico. A fan of the Southwest will enjoy following his progress from place to place.

The interviews with Abbey's friends are the best part. They talk about their friendship with Abbey, adventures, Abbey's flaws, and why they kept his secrets. I never thought Abbey was a perfect person; I do like his writing, but I do not agree with all of his points. Abbey's friends' stories confirmed my own beliefs about Abbey. Their individual stories were/are just as interesting as Abbey.

Mr Prentiss shares his frustrations with his current path, teaching in Grand Rapids, his preference to live closer to nature, etc. I mostly enjoyed reading about what he was thinking and feeling, its his memoir of his journey as much as anything else. However, he "varnishes" his thoughts and emotions a little too much, he knows he's being watched and it shows; at times and it comes off inauthentic.

Like a lot of other "journey" writings, he finds his goal, discovers that the journey is what mattered, not the goal, and then he reflects on that.

[Kalen · Rating 4 out of 5]

**** 1/2

I really loved this book though had I been in a different mood, the navel gazing couldn't have worn on me. What surprised me most of all is what a great biography of Edward Abbey it turned out to be and the interviews with his friends were gems.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wasn't what I thought it would be, but it feels wrong to penalize it for that. Don't take a drink every time he says something along the lines of "the journey is the destination." You'll be dead before you're halfway through. Still though, like I said, maybe it just wasn't for me.

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you know Abbey's work, brilliant. If you don't know Abbey's work, you'll want to.

[Mariah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is hands down my favorite book I read in 2020, and possibly my favorite book I've read in years!

Now, I have to be honest, I think my attachment to and enjoyment of this book comes in large part from the fact that I picked up in exactly the time in my life that I needed it most. When I arrived in red rock canyon country of western Colorado and Utah, I was immediately told that Edward Abbey's Desert Solitaire was basically required reading. The man has a knack for seeing and sharing both the beauty and the harshness of the desert for sure, but he also came off as a very strong personality, the type of guy I wouldn't actually want to be around in real life.

That all to say that I picked up Finding Abbey initially because I was interested to learn more about this giant of the desert. Through quotes from Abbey's writing, biographies, and interviews with his friends, Prentiss certainly does offer new insight into the enigmatic wanderer. But what really struck me was the journey that Prentiss went on personally in his search for Abbey's grave. As the saying goes, "It's not about the destination, but the journey," and that holds true here. A wanderer myself, I connected deeply with the feelings of loneliness and the search for some unnamed, unknownable Thing Prentiss expresses for himself and finds in Abbey's writing. I read this book at a time when I was feeling extraordinarily lonely myself, and seeing my emotions put into words, by not one but two authors, was a balm, a reminder that I was not alone.

Not everyone will connect with this book in the way that I did, but I do believe that there's something in here for everyone - be it adventure, nature writing, conservation, travel writing, history and biography, humor, or emotion. I'm adding it to my must-read recommendations for anyone who moves to the US southwest right after Desert Solitaire.

[Burwinkle Hendershot · Rating 2 out of 5]

Once you've read all of Edward Abbey's writings, and everything written by his friends and others who knew him, and you still want more, you will find this book. And, not far into its pages, you will realize you have reached the bottom of the barrel. Perhaps a more complete title for this volume would be "Finding Abbey: the Quest of a Middle-Aged Naif"...because in Sean Prentiss' self-obsessed search for the grave of a man who deliberately did not want his grave to be found, he seems unable to surrender his anxious ego to the "incomprehensible wonder of our brief lives under the oceanic sky" Abbey celebrated.

Others have mentioned Prentiss' frequent whining about his home and job and girlfriend-less life in Grand Rapids, and his frequent use of worn-out tropes about journeys and destinations and such. ("'The answer is never the answer,' I whisper to the cabin" is one typical example.) He often measures his own life against Abbey's, as if hoping his quest will earn the approval of his long-dead hero.

One thing it didn't do was to make him an interesting writer. I disappointedly gave up on Prentiss' dull and meandering prose before the halfway point and skipped ahead to the interviews with Ken Sleight and Doug Peacock. (Peacock's comments were easily the most engaging part of the book. No surprise, as Doug Peacock is an excellent writer. The other Abbey friends who are interviewed all have interesting things to say, and provide the book's only pleasures.)

On a side note: this paperback has to be a contender for Ugliest Book Cover of All Time. It features a starkly amateurish, light-gray-on-black line drawing of cactus and mountains, with title highlights and the entire back cover in screaming fluorescent orange. (What were they thinking?) It's just plain fugly.

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

"One of the beautiful things about Abbey's burial is that it keeps his anarchist spirit alive" (97).

Some other reviewers found the author's introspection self-indulgent, but I was riveted by his story and related deeply to his feelings about city and suburban life versus the Western landscape and habitat he so clearly worships. The interviews with Abbey's friends were just as fascinating, exposing the man, not the myth, in all his contradictions, complexity, and occasional downright offensiveness. This is the kind of adventure writing I love: where the journey ends up being more important than the goal. My daughter asked me about twenty pages from the end if I thought they would find the grave; I honestly had no idea and didn't care if they did. I loved Prentiss's quest no matter how it ended, as well as his final whispered promise to Abbey to "wrestle with all the choices and decisions and ideas that Abbey has made me think about these past two decades and during these past months as I've chased after him. I promise to continue to learn from and complicate his ideas. The end is never the end" (212).

Beautiful words; amazing journey; meaningful work. And if you've never read Desert Solitaire, please do.

"Nature is not a place to visit, it is home." - Gary Snyder

[Dave Ciskowski · Rating 4 out of 5]

A contemplative and personal account of Prentiss’ search for the environmental activist and anarchist. Prentiss searches not just for Abbey’s secret, illegal grave in the desert, but also for explanations of Abbey’s life and character, and even for insight into his own life and yearnings. Beginning in Abbey’s hometown of Indiana, Pennsylvania, Prentiss visits Abbey’s stops across the US, leading always to the desert southwest and Abbey’s fame and true love in the trackless desert. He examines Abbey’s charisma and flaws in equal measure, but the exploration is centered on Abbey’s discontent with civilization and love for the wilderness. The book is more meditation than biography, as Prentiss relates his love for Abbey to his own search for home and belonging. It may be too personal for those who are only seeking more information on Abbey, but it’s strongly written, and will resonate with anyone who is on their own search for meaning and belonging.

[Peter Bridgford · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are a person who loves Ed Abbey, then this is the book for you. If you are a person who hates Ed Abbey, then this is a book for you. If you setting out on adventures that usually have a lot of passion, but little reason, then you will love Sean Prentiss' journey in this book. I am someone who fell in love with Desert Solitaire by Ed Abbey. There are parts of that book that haunt me almost every day. I went on to read his fiction, but that first book remains the anchor of my love for the man's writing. As I got older, the real-time personality of Ed Abbey became more of a challenge to love as fully, but I love the man's spirit and his place in environmental writing. Sean Prentiss is a bigger fan of Ed Abbey, but the book is about SO much more than just trying to find the secret/hidden grave of Ed Abbey. Beautiful language, passions about writing and nature, and a rare glimpse into a free spirit on what the world would call as a ridiculous quest. A great read!

[Steve Fox · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'll admit that I felt an added connection to author Sean Prentiss thought Grand Rapids - a place we have both moved away from since "Finding Abbey" was published in 2015. I left in 2019 to Western Colorado - on the precipice of Edward Abbey country and a short jaunt over to Moab and Arches National Park. I have read a number of Abbey's books since moving here and feel a greater connection to the wild southwestern deserts through him. I also have an even stronger connection to mountains - as Prentiss expresses. I can now see mountains, every day, unlike the long stretches without sight of even the slightest mountains while living for nearly 20 years (in total) in Michigan. But more than that, "Finding Abbey" is a journey to learning more about the impactful author and activist who helped bring attention to preserving what some consider the wasteland of the southwestern deserts. Though interviews with Abbey's closest friends, Prentiss paints a deeper picture of Abbey that I appreciate.

[Peg Lotvin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am sure more than this author has searched for the final secret resting place of Ed Abbey, but Sean Prentiss is the first to write about his search. More than three quarters of the way through I thought he was looking for himself more than for a gravesite, but he really found it. Mercifully he kept the site a secret. After all, Abbey's friends buried him secretly and it should remain a secret. What's that old line, "two can keep a secret if one of them is dead"?
Other than that, this is a lovely book running through Ed Abbey's life with interviews with his closest friends. Funny, Sean never actually asked any of the friends exactly where the grave was. He preferred using the clues both written and oral.

[Forest · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are two stories at play here, a coming of age story for a young author and professor, and a biography of Edward Abby. This makes for a poetic wild ride appropriate to Edward Abby and his escapades. One might add that there is a third story, one of the limitations of life, and having the power to create, or destroy mystery. This sentence sums up the slow adventure found among these pages: "...walk, better yet crawl, on hands and knees, over the sandstone and through the thornbush and cactus. When traces of blood begin to mark your trail you'll begin to see something, maybe. Probably not.” One might feel they've found nothing and everything once they've finished this book, perhaps, a metaphor for life itself.

[Elizabeth Felicetti · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deft blending of substantive information about Edward Abbey alongside the writer's subjective search for defining and finding "home." Look forward to going back and analyzing how he made this book so suspenseful. Love how he writes about landscape. He's not a birder, but a phainopepla makes an appearance, which stirred this birder's heart!

[Tyler · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was recommended this book by someone special, perhaps some bias involved on her end, but nevertheless Sean’s writing shines in his comparison to his life and Abbey. The interviews with Abbey’s friends were compelling, and insightful, and Sean paints a beautiful landscape along his beautiful journey in search for a man who he holds close to his heart.

[Afton Mortensen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Could have benefited from more descriptions of the environment, rather than simply naming off canyons and cacti across the west. I also think we missed out on not getting more focus on the author and his relationship with his best friend, to coincide with the stories we hear from Abbey and his closest friends. A good story for someone stuck in a big city and missing the west during this pandemic.

[Alicia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting to read a book by an aspiring writer on another author. The book covers the unique experiences of the author and some investigative type journalism in regards to Edward Abbey. The professor in the author pops out a few times by first indicating a stance on some issue then arguing in the alternative in a nicely woven way.

[Jade He · Rating 3 out of 5]

this was not a technically well-written book. but it felt like a trip to the desert and the sacred sensation of sun on your scalp and the undying thirst for unnamed adventure and solitude and warm beer.

our author is a cliche unsettled wilderness man, and much of this book is quotes from famous writers and him agreeing with them

[Joyce Reynolds-Ward · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nicely done mix of memoir and biography. While Prentiss is ostensibly looking for Ed Abbey's grave, at the same time he's trying to find himself in a quintessential Abbeyesque way. Good look at the man and some of his friends.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall I enjoyed this book but it got a little exhausting at times- the author repetitively whined throughout the book about wanting to go out west, missing the mountains. Other than that, very interesting interviews and descriptions.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book geared toward super fans of Ed Abbey. If you are not off that ilk, I don’t see much of interest for you.

[Jace Stansbury · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you like Abbey, this is a worthwhile read.

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Happy Birthday, Ed.