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Maximum Sunlight
Maximum Sunlight is a journey into Tonopah, Nevada—a small city in the middle of the five-hundred-mile stretch of HWY 95 between Las Vegas and Reno.
Maximum Sunlight takes readers to Tonopah to try and find what exactly it is that’s out there. Told through a series of candid interviews and observations of town life, the book attempts to get beyond the stories people want to tell about a place—or don’t want to tell—into some kind of truth.
It is a tightly observed, thought-provoking, and at times heartbreaking tour of a place that’s strange and conflicted and, in a way, unlike anywhere else—but also a lot like a lot of America. Just not the America many ever get to see.
Maximum Sunlight takes readers to Tonopah to try and find what exactly it is that’s out there. Told through a series of candid interviews and observations of town life, the book attempts to get beyond the stories people want to tell about a place—or don’t want to tell—into some kind of truth.
It is a tightly observed, thought-provoking, and at times heartbreaking tour of a place that’s strange and conflicted and, in a way, unlike anywhere else—but also a lot like a lot of America. Just not the America many ever get to see.
- GenresNonfictionPhotography
150 pages, Paperback
Published December 1, 2016
1 person is currently reading
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
March 27, 2018
I absolutely loved this book. I found myself at the Wolfman Bookstore in Downtown Oakland by way of word of mouth, and when I found out they publish, too, I knew I had to grab whatever came out first.
I'm so happy I got this book. It's a quick read that pulls back the curtain on a small town in Tonopah, Nevada. It's everything you think a small town that's down on its luck is, but there's also a clown motel next to a cemetery.
Excellent original reporting by the author and stellar complimentary photography to really tie it all together. I can't wait to buy more titles from Wolfman.
I'm so happy I got this book. It's a quick read that pulls back the curtain on a small town in Tonopah, Nevada. It's everything you think a small town that's down on its luck is, but there's also a clown motel next to a cemetery.
Excellent original reporting by the author and stellar complimentary photography to really tie it all together. I can't wait to buy more titles from Wolfman.
October 30, 2019
Maximum Sunlight takes us on a trip through Tonopah, Nevada- a town I had never heard of, let alone thought I would be emotionally drawn to, but here I am, planning a trip to the Clown Hotel.
I found this book on the street; my neighbor was giving away books and the cover drew me to it. It was a minimalist but striking color photograph of the desert. I had it on my own bookshelf for about a year and then realized it was released by Wolfman Books, who put out Color Theory this year which I really admired, so I picked it up.
I’ll be honest- I wasn’t expecting to like it. My initial reaction after reading the back was: Journalism? Small town in Nevada? Sounds boring. And maybe that was my urban close-mindedness that the book is trying to address, because after the first chapter I was all about it, telling all my friends random tidbits from it and trying to loan them the book when I finished.
Day manages to walk this line between objective journalism and curiosity without coming off as judgmental or naive, and it seems the members of the town agree, the way they respond to her questions and general presence in the town.
Overall, very well done, and the accompanying photographs are great as they break up the sections and allow us to see some of the landmarks mentioned in each chapter. It’s a quick and pleasant read and it moves swiftly through the desert. I feel like I know the people mentioned in the story now, like I met them in my own travels.
Thank you Meagan for letting your audience live vicariously through your tales.
I found this book on the street; my neighbor was giving away books and the cover drew me to it. It was a minimalist but striking color photograph of the desert. I had it on my own bookshelf for about a year and then realized it was released by Wolfman Books, who put out Color Theory this year which I really admired, so I picked it up.
I’ll be honest- I wasn’t expecting to like it. My initial reaction after reading the back was: Journalism? Small town in Nevada? Sounds boring. And maybe that was my urban close-mindedness that the book is trying to address, because after the first chapter I was all about it, telling all my friends random tidbits from it and trying to loan them the book when I finished.
Day manages to walk this line between objective journalism and curiosity without coming off as judgmental or naive, and it seems the members of the town agree, the way they respond to her questions and general presence in the town.
Overall, very well done, and the accompanying photographs are great as they break up the sections and allow us to see some of the landmarks mentioned in each chapter. It’s a quick and pleasant read and it moves swiftly through the desert. I feel like I know the people mentioned in the story now, like I met them in my own travels.
Thank you Meagan for letting your audience live vicariously through your tales.
October 14, 2019
I read an excerpt of this book in Best American Non-required Reading and fell in love with it. It's a continuing exploration of American strangeness in the vein of David Foster Wallace; truth is stranger than fiction.
March 25, 2023
A beautiful little travelogue through a very strange yet quintessentially rural American town. Definitely worth the read.
April 8, 2019
Meagan Day embodies the “new” journalist giants of the 60s and 70s; she has the keen observational skills of Joan Didion and Tom Wolfe, and the up-for-anything attitude of Hunter Thompson.
She moves among hard drinking misfits, conspiracy theorists, and kids at play with aplomb. She treats each with the same baseline of dignity and respect to which every human being is entitled.
Meagan shows us a Nevada that is not just gambling, crackpots, and mysterious government activities. It’ home, where people go about their daily lives, carrying their special loads of emotional baggage.
Don’t get me wrong, Tonopah, and the desert upon which it sits, has its quirky and fascinating stories, which Day gloriously brings to life.
She moves among hard drinking misfits, conspiracy theorists, and kids at play with aplomb. She treats each with the same baseline of dignity and respect to which every human being is entitled.
Meagan shows us a Nevada that is not just gambling, crackpots, and mysterious government activities. It’ home, where people go about their daily lives, carrying their special loads of emotional baggage.
Don’t get me wrong, Tonopah, and the desert upon which it sits, has its quirky and fascinating stories, which Day gloriously brings to life.
February 20, 2023
This is a terrific, surprising book. The subject is fascinating: the isolated small town of Tonopah, surrounded entirely by government-owned desert wasteland and abandoned mines. Meagan Day is sensitive to her portrayal of the town’s residents and environs, mindful to avoid “pandering to the coastal urban fantasy of bizarre backwater Nevada, cherry-picking the details that are most luridly fascinating without providing significant context” (123). Day presents plainly the ugly, ignorant, and destructive in equal measure to the tender, caring, and communal impulses in the people she meets. Hannah Klein’s photography is an evocative accompaniment to the text. The lack of captions encourages an even deeper engagement with them.
May 28, 2017
An arresting, spare, and all-in-all fascinating account of the inhabitants of a small town in western Nevada. I believe the writing predates the age of trump by just a bit (so you don't see any references to him in the book); that said, 'Maximum Sunlight' strikes me as considerably more authentic reporting on the 'white working class' and rural whites than you are typically inundated with by the MSM. The people Day interviews drive the conversations of each vignette, and therein she lets them largely characterize themselves (and their town). I found it to be an honest and important read. And the photographs are beautiful.
July 19, 2020
A sad exploration into the desolate areas often looked over or driven around on purpose. This town has a terrible reputation amd for good reason. I was born in Nevada and only recently heard about this horrible place where discrimination is the rule and most people wouldn't stop here for any reason. I think the author is even a bit brave for the time spent in Tonopah. WOLFMAN books is doing great work, definitely one to watch for their fututre titles and current output.
March 8, 2020
I loved this book. Day is thoughtful and aware of her role as the “outside observer”. The town has an interesting history and the book is filled with interviews that range from charming to heartbreaking to puzzling. Will definitely be following her.
June 25, 2018
At twilight, you can't tell what a shadow entails.
The nation draws a blank on rural Nevada.
The nation draws a blank on rural Nevada.
September 12, 2018
Unique, interesting, short read combined with moody and beautiful photography. Worth picking up for a change of pace.
December 26, 2019
clown ghosts
May 16, 2021
Quick read about an interesting place I would never have heard of otherwise. I know Meagan Day's writing from her work in Jacobin, which I usually like. This is very different and really good.
May 27, 2022
interesting snapshot, reminds of rachel cusk conversation style narrative, usa in ways that i dont know it
September 26, 2020
This book is pretty good and I guess I recommend it. It’s a “small book” in the sense there isn’t a lot to it other than the time Meagan Day spends in this tiny town in the middle of nowhere Nevada. Actually, books don’t have to be more than they are about. There are a lot of nice pictures. I’ve made a point of not looking at the books I review for Goodreads in an attempt to see what I can recollect about the book a month, a year, three years after I’ve read it. I remember the name of the book and I remember Meagan Day wrote it. I don’t remember the photographer’s name. The reason I bought the book was because I was impressed with Day’s writing for Jacobin. I remember being excited by several of the reviews of “Maximum Sunlight’ that emphasized the fact she wasn’t dismissive or condescending to the inhabitants of this city I’ve forgotten the name of.
It was an interesting sounding town (I probably shouldn’t call it a “city). If I remember correctly, it really was out in the middle of nowhere (like multiple hours to the nearest city). Day spent quite a bit of book musing on the type of people who would move to such an out of the way place. There was a mother and her son. The son drank a lot. There was a hotel that had all manner of clown tchotchke. Actually, now that I sit down and try to write about this book I’m sitting here wondering if I did like it all. Did I like it when I was reading it? Sure, I guess. I made it through at a pretty reasonable clip. But sitting here now and trying to recollect what was in the book and how it made me feel while I was reading it I’m not feeling much of anything. A town in the middle of nowhere; random people, most I guess who were down on the luck. A bar, although I think Day ended up describing it as more a room where the town alcoholics gathered daily. Day sensed some danger in there one day.
When I bought the book I was hoping it was going to be something akin to “Hillbilly Elegy” or “Stranger in Their Own Land.” I was hoping Day’s examination of this town would be shot through with significant political insights. It wasn’t. I don’t remember if Day made any explicit or even implicit conclusions about politics at all. That’s fine. You can find a place on a map, a remote place, visit it, stay awhile, meet the people, tell or let them tell their stories, and let that be that. The pictures were cool. Perhaps looking back at this book and not feeling too excited about writing about it is shaded by the fact I don’t really read Day’s contributions to Jacobin anymore. I don’t really read Jacobin anymore. Anyway, the book was fine. It wasn’t boring. Sometimes it’s nice to buy things to support an author you like or a publishing house your like. It’s an insignificant decision and financially negligible to the health of the publishing house, but it made me feel good about the purchase. If you’re looking for a book that gives excellent insights into the thinking of Trump voters in deep red states then Arlie Russell Hoschschild’s “Stranger in Their Own Land” is the book for you.
It was an interesting sounding town (I probably shouldn’t call it a “city). If I remember correctly, it really was out in the middle of nowhere (like multiple hours to the nearest city). Day spent quite a bit of book musing on the type of people who would move to such an out of the way place. There was a mother and her son. The son drank a lot. There was a hotel that had all manner of clown tchotchke. Actually, now that I sit down and try to write about this book I’m sitting here wondering if I did like it all. Did I like it when I was reading it? Sure, I guess. I made it through at a pretty reasonable clip. But sitting here now and trying to recollect what was in the book and how it made me feel while I was reading it I’m not feeling much of anything. A town in the middle of nowhere; random people, most I guess who were down on the luck. A bar, although I think Day ended up describing it as more a room where the town alcoholics gathered daily. Day sensed some danger in there one day.
When I bought the book I was hoping it was going to be something akin to “Hillbilly Elegy” or “Stranger in Their Own Land.” I was hoping Day’s examination of this town would be shot through with significant political insights. It wasn’t. I don’t remember if Day made any explicit or even implicit conclusions about politics at all. That’s fine. You can find a place on a map, a remote place, visit it, stay awhile, meet the people, tell or let them tell their stories, and let that be that. The pictures were cool. Perhaps looking back at this book and not feeling too excited about writing about it is shaded by the fact I don’t really read Day’s contributions to Jacobin anymore. I don’t really read Jacobin anymore. Anyway, the book was fine. It wasn’t boring. Sometimes it’s nice to buy things to support an author you like or a publishing house your like. It’s an insignificant decision and financially negligible to the health of the publishing house, but it made me feel good about the purchase. If you’re looking for a book that gives excellent insights into the thinking of Trump voters in deep red states then Arlie Russell Hoschschild’s “Stranger in Their Own Land” is the book for you.
July 28, 2025
Unique style and topic. Very fun to learn about a place I didn’t know existed. Really enjoyed the author’s observations. Loved how she titled each chapter.
April 29, 2021
Here are the questions discussed at the Reading the Western Landscape Book Community Book Discussion on Zoom on Wednesday, January 27, 2021:
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July 3, 2018fun book. i wish more united statesians would write about other united statians.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews