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Bad Land

Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
Bad Land traces Jonathan Raban's engrossing journey through Montana's Great Plains, one of America's most isolated and least explored regions. Blending history and contemporary observation, Raban illuminates the vast prairies and the homesteaders whose ambitions often faltered amidst this unforgiving landscape. The book reveals a complex portrait of American identity, exposing the darker consequences of a lost innocence, all while capturing the spirit of hope that once flourished there.
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Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

Ideal for readers fascinated by travel and adventure, American history enthusiasts, and anyone interested in thoughtful explorations of culture and landscape.

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Jonathan Raban's echnating history of the Great Plains of America, charting the untold story of the land and the ravages of the Great Depression.

A reissue of the late master travel writer's magnum opus, with a new introduction by Jane Smiley.

Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description
Jonathan Raban's enthralling journey into the history of the Great Plains of Montana - the least populated, most uncharted region of the United States - to uncover the heart and soul of the country. Bringing to life the extraordinary landscape of the prairie and the homesteaders whose dreams foundered there, and reaching through history to the present day, Bad Land uncovers the dangerous legacy of American innocence gone sour. Reissued with a new introduction from Jane Smiley, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning A Thousand Acres, this is Jonathan Raban at his finest. 'Bad Land should be recognized as a blazing classic' - Sunday Telegraph

Series: Picador Collection

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Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?

Praised as a "blazing classic" by the Sunday Telegraph, Bad Land combines scrupulous research with eloquent and compassionate writing, delivering a riveting narrative recognised by the Observer for its superb storytelling. The New York Times highlights Raban's tempered and patient tone, which offers a unique, affectionate insight into America's immigrant-fuelled optimism. This travel book stands out for its sensitivity, intelligence, humour, and stirring prose.

Book Hero reading reviews

Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9781035034529

Publisher: Pan Macmillan

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 14 September 2023

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: Picador

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 21.0mm

Width: 130.0mm

Height: 197.0mm

Weight: 246g

Pages: 352

About the Author

Jonathan Raban was the author of over a dozen books, both fiction and non-fiction, including Passage to Juneau, Bad Land, Hunting Mister Heartbreak, Coasting, Old Glory, Arabia, Soft City, Waxwings and Surveillance. Over the span of six decades, he won the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Royal Society of Literature's Heinemann Award, the Thomas Cook Award, the PEN West Creative Nonfiction Award, the Pacific Northwest Booksellers' Award, and the Governor's Award of the State of Washington. His work appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, Harpers, The New York Review of Books, Outside, Atlantic Monthly, New Republic, The London Review of Books, and other magazines. In 1990 Raban, a British citizen, moved from London to Seattle, where he lived with his daughter until his death in 2023.

Also by Jonathan Raban

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  • Father and Son
    'A beautiful, compelling memoir . . . This, Raban's final work, is a gorgeous achievement" - Ian McEwan On 11 June 2011, three days short of his sixty-ninth birthday, Jonathan Raban suffered a stroke which left him unable to use the right side of his body. Learning to use a wheelchair in a rehab facility outside Seattle and resisting the...
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    'A beautiful, compelling memoir. ... Father and Son is an exquisite, sometimes lunatic tension between powerful emotions and carnage on one side, and on the other, the conventional codes of what must remain unsaid. This, Raban's final work, is a gorgeous achievement" - Ian McEwan On 11 June 2011, three days short of his sixty-ninth birthday, Jonathan Raban suffered a...
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  • Coasting
    A valuable book and a necessary one. One of the funniest and cleverest voyages on record. โ€” Christopher Hitchens, New Statesman The finest writer afloat since Conrad. โ€” Geoffrey Moorhouse, The Guardian Unfailingly witty and entertaining. โ€” Salman Rushdie Coasting around Britain single-handed in an antique two-masted sailing boat, Jonathan Raban conducts a masterly exploration of England and the English...
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  • For Love or Money
    Jonathan Raban is the only person I listen to in matters of travel and books and writing in general. Reading him, talking to him as I have over fifty years, he has made my work better and me happier. - Paul Theroux For Love and Money is as good a book as there is about the writing life. Delighted that...
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    Of all his generation's travellers, Jonathan Raban is the most sophisticated, writing with a subtle and imaginative brilliance. โ€” Colin Thubron One of the most humane and visionary of all travel writers. โ€” Jeremy Seal Into Jonathan Raban's familiar Earls Court neighbourhood after the 1970s oil boom came new visitors from the Arab world, dressed in floor-length robes and yashmaks....
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