Victoria (YSB) - reviewed on 12/1/2009 + 636 more book reviews

It shouldn't be qualified as one man tracing the steps of John Steinbeck's _Travels with Charley_, but more as one man's trip that was inspired by John Steinbeck's travels, as there were diversions from the original path. It was fun in that it is certainly the type of vacation that I would like to take with my own dog some day. I was quite disappointed that he didn't step foot in Illinois, and all in all, it didn't feel like a very thorough tour of America as a whole.
My main pet peeve throughout the book was the way he referred to his golden retriever and his wife collectively as "The Blondes"... and it was at first confusing in that he referred to his wife as "the chief" and rarely by her name. Also, the book had many dull moments and felt more like reading someone's private diary than a book... I mean, I don't really care what he ate for dinner every single night! The constant underlying factor of politics became a bit annoying as well, since I wasn't expecting to read about that, and was hoping for more about his dog, seeing how different dogs are treated across America... some of that was in it, but he spent much more time obsessing over the political climate.

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