Kingdoms in the Air: Dispatches from the Far Away

Description

Best known for his sweeping international and political fiction narratives, including The Woman Who Lost Her Soul, which won the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and was finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, Bob Shacochis began his writing career as a pioneering journalist and contributing editor for Outside Magazine and Harper's. Kingdoms in the Air brings together the very best of Shacochis's culture and travel essays in one livewire collection that spans his global adventures and his life passions; from surfing, to his obsession with the South American dorado, to the time he went bushwhacking in Mozambique. Replete with Shacochis's signature swagger, humour, and crystalline wisdom, Kingdoms in the Air is a majestic and essential collection from one of our most important writers. "Whether he's in Cuba, Mozambique, or attempting to climb Mount Ararat, [Shacochis] vividly places you in both the past and present of his destinations . . . [his] restlessness and recklessness, all couched in a headlong maximalist prose, are impossible to resist."-Boston Globe "Shacochis' fiery, wrought prose is on full display . . . This is travel writing at its finest." -Men's Journal, a Best Book of the Month

Bob Shacochis's first collection of stories, Easy in the Islands, won the National Book Award for First Fiction, and his second collection, The Next New World, was awarded the Prix de Rome from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is also the author of the novel Swimming in the Volcano, a finalist for the National Book Award, The Immaculate Invasion, a work of literary reportage that was a finalist for The New Yorker Book Award for Best Nonfiction of the Year; and The Woman Who Lost Her Soul, which won the Dayton Peace Prize and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Shacochis is a contributing editor at Outside, a former columnist for Gentleman's Quarterly, and has served as a contributing editor for Harper's and GQ. His op-eds on the US military, Haiti, and Florida politics have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal.

Praise for KINGDOMS IN THE AIR "The pieces collected in Kingdoms in the Air are vivid portraits of iconoclasts and rugged individualists who have surrendered their Western comforts for adventure and higher purpose in the developing world . . . Shacochis evokes the pains and pleasures of [his] trek with lyrical prose." New York Times Book Review "Shacochis' fiery, wrought prose is on full display . . . This is travel writing at its finest." Men's Journal, a Best Book of the Month "[A] career-defining collection of magazine writing . . . [it] inspires us not to argue with destiny." Los Angeles Times "Shacochis is intent on nailing down what it means to be an American on the global stage of the late-20th and early-21st centuries . . . [he] uses every weapon in his writer's arsenal. Comic hyperbole and copious high dudgeon lead the way. Capsule national histories and sharp contemporary observations fill out the picture. Whether he's in Cuba, Mozambique, or attempting to climb Mount Ararat, he vividly places you in both the past and present of his destinations . . . [his] restlessness and recklessness, all couched in a headlong maximalist prose, are impossible to resist." Boston Globe "[This book] gives readers a vicarious sidecar seat for a life for which 'adventure travel' is far too mild, and simple, a term . . . Shacochis is interested in the places that are not easy, and in how it changes us to visit them and how we change them in return . . . He melds his personal experiences of some of the globe's wildest places with incisive analyses of history, culture, politics and more . . . [with] wry self-awareness, a tender heart and a brilliant, analytical intellect. His writing is simply splendid." Tampa Bay Times "One of the articles' beauties is their absence of bravado; instead, there is a big heart, an eye alert to beauty, a temperament to engage different ways of being in the world...and an existential awareness of atmosphere: history, landscape, culture, prospects." Minneapolis Star Tribune "[A] career-defining collection of magazine writing . . . [it] inspires us not to argue with destiny." Los Angeles Times "Poignant, observant, and swashbuckling all at once . . . Shacochis at his no-bullshit best... not to be missed." Outside Magazine "[An] exuberant travel and cultural anthology . . . Shacochis brings each setting to life with a perceptive eye, an edgy devotion to fresh language, and mastery at capturing group interaction . . . his diverse, vibrant essays, brimming with initiative, may inspire some to seek the unique rewards of unstructured travel." Booklist (starred review) "Witty, irreverent . . . [an] enlightening travel collection for a voyage of self-discovery." Kirkus Reviews