Jerry’s review of Dogging Steinbeck: How I Went in Search of John Steinbeck's America, Found My Own America, and Exposed the Truth about 'Travels with Charley' > Likes and Comments

Thanks, Jerry, for a fair assessment of my book and what I did or did not do well. The angry-man part -- which so many people, including the Steinbeck scholars, charged me with, is perplexing. My wife, mom and fellow journalists did not see it -- or at least they were not offended or put off by it. My sarcasm and mean-and-nasty tone -- 'hectoring' one top Steinbeck scholar (who praised my dogged journalism) called it -- is what veteran newspaper opinion-page columnists like me are encouraged to do. I thought I made enough cheap jokes, hyperbolic wide-cracks and self-deprecating comments that people would get that I was having fun calling Steinbeck's iconic book a 'fraud' -- which I did on my trip and with my book, which, like it or not, changed the way 'Charley' will be read forever. Thanks again.