Turning his back on the British legal profession and the requirement to account for every six minutes of his time, Geoff Steward and his lucky five-inch articulated Doctor Who figure go off-grid and on the road across America. From New York to Alaska, he tries to fend for himself without his trusty PA and life support, the unflappable Charmaine, for whom contentment lies in Jesus Christ and custard creams.
With his blend of waspish wit and mischievous charm, Steward seeks out normal Americans, such as Joe le Taxi, the former NYPD officer who was one of the first on the scene at the Twin Towers and now runs an extortionate executive taxi service; Pam and Bob, a paranoid psychiatrist and a failed actor who once saw the back of Meryl Streep s head; Taylor the Alaskan bushwhacker who was raised by wolves and revels in their scat; Jeb the Yosemite inn-sitter who lives his life at the pace of a Ford Model T; Kacey Musgraves, the controversial country music star staying at the farm in Tennessee; and Sheriff Duke of Calhoun County, South Carolina, who reintroduces Steward to the long (and armed) arm of the law. For anyone at a crossroads, contemplating a temporary or permanent career break, this affectionate travel romp is essential reading. Journeying coast-to-coast across the US with Steward might just remind you that, despite the post-Trump hysteria, there are many normal and decent Americans out there
Geoff Steward is a British lawyer and an American author. He is better at writing than he is at the law. He has four children and two-spare children. He has no room for any more offspring in his life, but there is always room for another guitar. His book is for Americans and un-Americans everywhere.
I really wanted to like this book. The idea of chucking everything for a few months and just travelling is something that everyone has felt at some point in their life but lack the courage or more often finances, to do it. Being a lawyer, the author has the means, so he takes off with his wife, kids and “spare kids”(what he calls his step kids) for America. Initially I really enjoyed the sarcasm and wit of his travelogue. He seemed caustic at times but it all seemed mostly good natured and he comes across early on as a pretty likeable guy. Then for me, things go a bit off the rails. I don’t want to turn this into a hate fest of this book, I didn’t hate it, but there were parts of it that were just unpleasant. His interactions with strangers on his travels were often interspersed with him commenting on how physically repulsive he found them. To quote 3 of many:
“He has a dirty baseball cap on the wrong way round, a ginger beard, and is wearing long baggy shorts and oversized shoes that resemble what a vagrant circus clown might wear. She looks like the religious antagonist with bad teeth out ofOrange Is the New Black.”
“The father has the hair cover and the physique of a three-toed sloth. He is suffering from the loud and stupid affliction which blights only American tourists.”
“People from Alaska (the 49th state) refer to the rest of America as the ‘Lower 48’, which I suspect is also the average IQ level of the people from Juneau.”
These lines didn’t seem funny to me, just really mean spirited. Likewise, his wishing cruel deaths on strangers who offend him was funny in an awkward way at first but after 5 or 6 examples of this, it just seemed wrong:
“I am hoping that Poppa Sloth will drink too many coco locos, topple off his submerged bar stool and drown himself rather than the call of the macaws.”
“I am too angry with Ranger Dan to partake in his next guessing game, which again has a log identifying theme, but this time it is not driftwood; it is a fallen branch. Were it not so rotten and covered in soft yellow lichen, I would club him over the head with it.”
“I start to hatch a plot as to how Larry and I might lure Pam here. We could slice her up, put her into rectangular-shaped cans, and drop the S. Alternatively, if we lured her here but let her live, I wouldn’t feel any guilt because if the bears don’t like Spam, they would certainly draw the line at eating Pam. Her fussy eating requirements and inability to select a meal which appears on the menu would also be cured by nothing but Spam to choose from. If she doesn’t make it out alive, Jon Krakauer can write a book about her called Into the Vile. I would buy it but flick straight to the back to make sure it had a tragic ending.”
It was enough. But there were two passages in particular that finally put me off. The first about dachshunds stung by bees:
“Jackie immediately googles ‘dachshunds with bee stings’ and I would urge you to do the same; Jackie is concerned to find out the impact on our dog’s health, whereas I am drawn to the images. The best ones are the dachshunds stung on either the nose or the mouth. Their faces swell to give them the appearance of Marlon Brando with cotton wool stuffed in his cheeks in The Godfather. I doubt I could laugh so hard at any other photographs, except perhaps the swelling head of my Mexican child-nemesis.”
And this about his children:
“When each of my children were babies, I used to enjoy watching them in their baby-carrier as their little eyes got heavier and heavier until they quietly drifted off to sleep; I would then clap my hands or slam a door, making their startled little arms instinctively shoot up over their little heads.”
I guess some people could find humor there somewhere, but I couldn’t. Some people could laugh at not letting their infant children sleep or watching dachshunds in pain, I’m not one of them.
All this being said, some of his descriptions of scenic places in America are quite well written and enjoyable. I don’t think he’s an awful person and most of these passages are in jest, I get it. It just isn’t my kind of humor. In the end however, I was left pondering the irony of a book purporting to search for nice Americans yet not being particularly nice himself. To be fair, he closes the book by saying how wonderful he found America and Americans to be. I just didn’t see much evidence of that throughout the book.
Geoff Steward is keen from the outset that his readers are fully aware he’s not the type of lawyer who wears a wig. He is, in fact, a specialist in “litigation, with a focus on intellectual property, sports and competition law.” In other words, he’s a solicitor. When we first meet him, at home in West Sussex, he’s feeling overworked, harassed, restless, middle-aged and has a hankering to go on an American road trip – about which he hopes to write a book.
And so, it came to pass. The result of Geoff’s 2016 sabbatical is the light-hearted In Search of Nice Americans, subtitled, Off the Grid, On the Road and State to State in Trump’s America, a disorderly but entertaining drive across the USA, ending with a memorable few days in Costa Rica before returning to Blighty.
A Kerouac-type odyssey this is not – and there is nothing impromptu or bohemian about the trip. For starters, he receives professional help creating his itinerary, and endeavours to stick as closely as possible to the travel agent’s pre-booked hotels, tours and meals. He also has in tow Jackie, his volatile Irish wife, whom he deliberately, and rather sadistically, I feel, irritates and generally discombobulates at every given opportunity. I imagine that twenty-five years in the legal profession doesn’t always bring out the best in a person.
Twice wedded, and with several children from both marriages (his step kids are referred to throughout as his “spare children”), Geoff loves music, movies (especially those starring Tom Hanks) and books, so he has great fun exploring New York, Los Angeles and Nashville. He is in his element when visiting The Johnny Cash Museum and the Grand Ole Opry, but is the first to admit that he is easily irritated by people, and therefore enjoys lampooning elderly American couples on his Alaskan cruise. He has an immense liking for the affable, easy going Nashvillians and their incredible Music City; less so for the reserved Angelenos, but he meets many fascinating characters along the way.
Each chapter comes with its own soundtrack, so, for instance, Chapter Nine, in which he passes the Dakota Building in New York, has the sub-heading, Soundtrack: John Lennon – ‘Nobody Told Me’. Whether in Utah, Yosemite or Savannah, he faithfully recounts amusing conversations, describes his accommodation in detail, takes an interest in the wildlife and is generally witty and facetious about everything and everybody, including himself.
This is no spiritual journey, but it is entertaining, and I could imagine sitting in my local pub listening to Geoff regale fellow drinkers with anecdotes about his jaunt to the USA.
A light and humorous read for chilly autumnal evenings.
I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway. I don't often read non fiction or travelogues but I did enjoy this. Geoff Steward (never call him Jeff Stewart) obviously has a successful career and a not so successful family life which he describes with great humour. This humour is also applied to his travels which don't always turn out as planned but the book is all the better for that - how many of us have planned the 'perfect trip' only to find that things don't work out quite as we expected? His thumbnail sketches of people and places are always entertaining and on the whole the Americans he meets are very nice indeed.
Thank you Goodreads for sending me this book. An enjoyable and light-hearted read. This is a fast paced travelogue across the USA containing some wonderful snapshots of the places and tales from people he meets, all vividly described by the author. We meet some odd characters throughout the book, who add to the charm of the whole thing. The book is very well written and comes with a large dose of humour, often very cynical, but always very sharp.
***I received a free copy of this book from the author***
Once I realized the title does this book a disservice I was able to sit back and kind of enjoy the book for what it is. I'm an American who was selfishly relieved to find this book was not about America, especially Trump's America. There were few insights made about the country and it's people. Mostly the book was about Geoff Steward, himself; a middle-aged man who seems burnt out on his life in the UK. He has more to say about his children, his law practice and his poor suffering girlfriend (who was his travelling companion but used as insult-humor target practice. He looked at her as more of an object than a human) than he does about America. If you want to read about a humorous British lawyer making biting observations about bears, American caricatures, his girlfriend, lawyers, music, his children and his spare children then you'll love this book.
"In search of nice Americans: Off the grid, on the road and State to State in Trump's America" is a misnomer. First of all, this trip was undertaken in August of 2016, when Trump hadn't been elected. If anything, this was still Obama's America. Second, when author Geoff Steward (who keeps insisting Americans mistake is last name for his first name, but also that he keeps meeting Americans named Jeff Stewart) writes that "I did find some nice Americans" and that "most of them are nice" he does so on page 295 (of 298). In fact, if it were up to me, I'd have called this book "Me and my snarky sojourns into Obama's America," because he neither seems to try to meet nice Americans, nor does he seem to like any of the ones he does meet. The closest thing to any search for nice Americans seems to be his failed attempt to locate Tom Hanks's star on Hollywood Boulevard (p.200), and when on the same page he writes "LA is keen to strike a pose, but doesn't want to get to know you," I can't help but find it ironic. We're two-thirds in, and all this Brit writes about is his job and family (in fact, pages 1 to 60 are about British litigation and descriptions of every one of his kids) and how he wishes half of the people he encounters would die a slow and painful death, without any attempt to really get to know some (nice) Americans. On page 220 he writes "she is such an enthusiastic fan of the Grand Ole Opry, that it is hard not to adopt her," and it's the first nice thing he has said about any American in the book. "That's what I love about Nashville," he writes (p.221) "everyone is so warm and welcoming," yet much of what he writes about the city is some snide remarks about street evangelists. He seriously seems to have written something different in his mind than what I've been reading, for in his acknowledgements he looks back on "...the affectionate portrayal of everyday American people contained in these pages ..." (p.301), Only on page 297 do we get a glimpse of what kindness has transpired during his vacation: "what I will miss most is The Wilderness Adventurer ... for the nice Americans we met, the stories they told and, simply put, the sense of belonging and community." Well, that's what I missed most as well, because none of these affections can be found in the heap of sarcasm that is this book.
Where there is love for Nashville and its music, there is exultation in Savannah. And finally does he let up, finally do I read what I wished the entire book would be.His facade of sarcasm subsides for much of the pages he uses to describe this leg of the trip. But it's page 229 by then, and it simply seems too little too late, all too quick to vaporize before the ego that is Geoff Stewart. A three-page description (251 to 254) of his home county of Clevelend (England) is followed by the sentence "I am thinking all this as I drive past Cleveland, North Carolina." And then he meets his second nice American: an Indian who likes England. Go figure. From page 259 onwards, it's 30-odd pages of vacationing in Costa Rica. Which even in 2017, when the book was printed, wasn't part of "Trump's America," so a short calculation will lead to the conclusion that a full third of this book has not been anywhere near America or Americans.
Frankly, I was disappointed by this book, not because it wasn't funny (I guess it was for large parts), but because it didn't own up to its promise. It wasn't about America, nor wasn't it about meeting nice Americans. And I wanted to read the book that was promised, not the one that I bought.
(With thanks to nudge-book.com/newbooks for the review copy, where this review also appears.)
Subtitled 'Off the grid, on the road and state to state in Trump's America', Geoff Steward's book 'In Search of Nice Americans' piqued my interest with its opening paragraph where he states, "This is not quite a travelogue; it is not quite an autobiography; it is not quite a motivational self-help book; it is not quite a mid-life crisis. Frankly, I am not quite sure what it is that I have written or quite why you are reading it." How can you not want to read on?
I like books that make me laugh and where I learn something new, and Geoff's book did both. Taking a 40 day trip in America (and Costa Rica) he visits places that are of interest to him (Seattle, Nashville, the Sundance resort and L.A. amongst others) and which mirror his interests - primarily music. Although the book is a travelogue of sorts, it's much more of a personal journey which reflects on him, his work as a lawyer and his family, and they feature frequently. I think it's this that makes the book difficult to classify solely as a travelogue (as Geoff himself admits in the opening paragraph above) but it's also what makes the book interesting. There are some very funny moments - my personal favourite was the mini-Alaskan cruise where he meets some 'interesting' American tourists who take a shine to him (and the bench in his cabin.)
The title of the book is slightly misleading, as almost all the Americans the author meets are nice, and the people are secondary to the places he visits. Saying that, I very much enjoyed reading Geoff's thoughts on the people and the places he visited, and his sense of humour really appealed to me. The book is an interesting and easy read and one that will put a smile on your face. I look forward to reading the sequel, and I'm sure you will too after you've read this book.
Geoff Seward wants a sabbatical from the cut-throat world of lawyering, so takes off for two months, after the dumpster fire of 2016, to America where (in this turbulent Trumpy climate) that there must be some decent people there somewhere. He harks back to university era visits to see how the country and its people are doing, bringing his textbook humour and wit to this deftly and readable travelogue. Buckle up for absurdities and fascinating characters and yes, despite some of the God awful people he meets, there really ARE some decent, rational and intelligent people. Who knew? I really enjoyed this. It has a very sardonic and Bryson-esque feel to it. Recommended.
Some of this book was really funny. Quite a bit of the rest of it tried really hard to be funny, too. Unfortunately, the author seemed to try to cover up the bits that weren't funny by being nasty instead, and hoping that the reader wouldn't notice.
I wanted to like this book, I really did. I did enjoy the self-deprecating humour, in parts; I just found it difficult to get past the constant put-downs of his girlfriend and children.
I really enjoyed this book. His descriptions are hilarious and spot on and I hope he revises it now that Trump is in the WH It’s a fabulous travelogue and the music is fab - get the Spotify playlist!
Entertaining, breezy writing style. A lot jokes fall very flat, mostly due to their cruelty. I get tired of him making fun of Jackie for essentially every one of their interactions. And he doesn’t seem to try hard to meet people - which I thought was the premise of the book.
Reminiscent of Bill Bryson’s best vintage travelogues, Notes on A small Island, but in America. Witty and entertaining. Was the perfect book to take my mind off Christmas!
To quote another reviewer: 'Man goes on holiday, does the usual holiday things and writes a book.' This is no man gives up work for a life-changing experience. I got a little tired of the author's constant reference back to time-accounting life as a very well paid lawyer. To me it was just a very average travel monologue, without giving much insight into the so-called real America.