Balancing Acts

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Essays take the reader on a journey of discovery, from the jungles of Belize to the mountains of Yemen. The 25 essays in this book cover territory from Wyoming to Yemen, by way of Okefenokee Swamp. He is an extraordinary observer of both people and places, and the results are uniformly interesting when he focuses on either. His occasional essays on literature are considerably less interesting, and his self-analysis less interesting still, but both are few and far between in this collection. Hoagland excels in noticing the small details--how the shape of a cowboy hat reflects the wearer's home region, how a mud house erodes, what it's like to ride a transcontinental train at night. His essays are, as a result, full of unexpected pleasures--sentences and paragraphs that make you sit up and say "Wow!" Recommended for all essay-reading enthusiasts. . . and as an education for anyone who's never thought of essays as literature. Show more