The USA in 50 Books

I’ve just left Ohio, and I’m about to enter Delaware. After that, I head into West Virginia and South Carolina, then pass through Tennessee and Connecticut on my way to Idaho.

Those of you familiar with the geography of the United States might be wondering what on earth’s wrong with my map. None of those states are next to each other. How can I travel like that?

Well, there’s travel and there’s travel. It could take a lifetime of journeying to explore this diverse country, from the Louisiana bayous to the California beaches, from the solitudes of Wyoming to the city-that-never-sleeps vibe of New York, from the Texas Panhandle to the endless cornfields of Iowa. Or, you could trust those who have gone before you and already captured the USA in so much detail.

I’m talking about writers who have seen stories in the culture they’re part of, and recorded them for us. Whether they’ve written novels or non-fiction, they’ve sought to portray the life happening all around them, and by reading enough of them we can appreciate the breadth of the country.

How many is ‘enough?’ Well, 50 seemed the right number. There are 50 states, so I decided to read one book that represented each state.

I’ve written about reading plans several years ago, and given you my three essential tips for creating them.  This one was a bigger plan, and it needed some thought. How could I make sure my reading list would contain state-specific books, but also give a well-rounded view of the whole country?

Some choices were easy. It had been a long time since I’d read To Kill A Mockingbird, so that was Alabama sorted. Same for Louisiana, where A Confederacy of Dunces stands out, and I was immediately looking forward to spending time in those two books. They’re both delights in their different ways, as young Scout Finch and the tragi-comic Ignatius J Reilly seek to understand the worlds around them.

Some states were harder, though. Here’s a test: what book comes to mind when you think about South Dakota? Or Maine? Or Wisconsin? I’m sure that if you’re a proud Wisconsinite, Mainer or South Dakotan, you will already be yelling book titles at me, amazed that I’ve never heard of them. The rest of you are probably shrugging your shoulders just like I did when faced with the question. Google was my friend here, of course, and searching for “10 best books set in Maine” gave me a fine selection to pick from.

New York presented the opposite problem. I could have picked 50 books from here, and for a while I was dazzled by the choices. Tom Wolfe’s comprehensive portrayal of New York society, Bonfire of the Vanities, or E.L. Doctorow’s historical novel set in the early 1900s, Ragtime? Or maybe the linked stories in Tama Janowitz’s Slaves of New York?

California was just as hard: a thriller by Michael Connelly or Raymond Chandler? The Chinese immigrants of Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club or the differing San Franciscos shown in either Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City or Phillip K Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? In the end, after choosing for every other state, I chose a classic that I’d never read for each of these, both shown in the image below.

I found it interesting that many of the books that made my list were written between about 1990 and 2010. Why that time period in particular, I wondered? Did they hit some sweet spot, being recent enough to be remembered, and yet old enough to feel out of everyday reach? Some I had read when they first came out, and jumped at the opportunity to read again – David Guterson’s courtroom drama/wartime reminiscence Snow Falling on Cedars for instance, or Charles Frazier’s Civil War-era Cold Mountain.

But there were also those that I never got to before they vanished from bookstore shelves, such as Jeffrey Eugenides’ The Virgin Suicides and Carol Shields’ The Stone Diaries. Others were books I’d always meant to read – The Secret History by Donna Tartt and Beloved by Toni Morrison – and was glad to finally have the chance.

I tried to throw in a few that broke the mould of ‘literary novel.’ Some thrillers by Patricia Cornwell and Lee Child. Novels for younger readers by Mark Twain and S.E. Hinton. Non-fiction by Bill Bryson and Jon Krakauer. The humour of Garrison Keillor and Carl Hiaasen. An Arthur Miller play. Sports books by H.G. Bissinger and Chad Harbach. Several collections of short stories.

One of the points of the whole exercise, of course, was to broaden my understanding of the USA, so I was delighted to find some authors I knew nothing about. Sandra Cisneros, Kent Haruf, Richard Russo and Matthew Quick are just four of those I met here for the first time, along with the Hawaiian Kaui Hart Hemmings.

Finally, before I give you the complete list, state by state, let me tell you about the final difficulty I faced. There were a few states where I knew which author I wanted to read, but had to decide on the exact book. John Irving is a New Hampshire man, Anne Tyler represents Maryland and Carl Hiaasen is so essentially Floridan that they will probably have to close the state when he dies, but which book of theirs would I read? In the end, I just picked the first one that came my way. Sometimes, that’s the way it goes when you’re travelling.

Oh, and can I tell you one more delightful aspect of travelling? Telling everyone back home what you’ve seen. That’s for a later blog. Check back soon…

State	Author	Title
Alabama	Harper Lee	To Kill A Mockingbird
Alaska	Jon Krakauer	Into the Wild
Arizona	Barbara Kingsolver	The Bean Trees
Arkansas	Maya Angelou	I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
California	John Steinbeck	East of Eden
Colorado	Kent Haruf	Plainsong
Connecticut	Richard Yates	Revolutionary Road
Delaware	Chuck Palahniuk	Fight Club
Florida	Carl Hiaasen	Lucky You
Georgia	John Berendt	Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
Hawaii	Kaui Hart Hemmings	The Descendants
Idaho	Marilynne Robinson	Housekeeping
Illinois	Sandra Cisneros	The House on Mango Street
Indiana	Carol Shields	The Stone Diaries
Iowa	Bill Bryson	The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid
Kansas	Truman Capote	In Cold Blood
Kentucky	Toni Morrison	Beloved
Louisiana	John Kennedy Toole	A Confederacy of Dunces
Maine	Richard Russo	Empire Falls
Maryland	Anne Tyler	A Spool of Blue Thread
Massachusetts	Arthur Miller	The Crucible
Michigan	Jeffrey Eugenides	The Virgin Suicides
Minnesota	Garrison Keillor	Lake Wobegon Days
Mississippi	William Faulkner	The Sound and the Fury
Missouri	Mark Twain	The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Montana	Norman Maclean	A River Runs Through It
Nebraska	Willa Cather	My Antonia
Nevada	Hunter S Thompson	Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
New Hampshire	John Irving	World According to Garp
New Jersey	Junot Diaz	The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
New Mexico	Cormac McCarthy	Cities of the Plain
New York	Edith Wharton	The Age of Innocence
North Carolina	Charles Frazier	Cold Mountain
North Dakota	Louise Erdrich	The Round House
Ohio	Sherwood Anderson	Winesburg, Ohio
Oklahoma	S E Hinton	The Outsiders
Oregon	Ken Kesey	One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Pennsylvania	Matthew Quick	The Silver Linings Playbook
Rhode Island	Henry James	The Ivory Tower
South Carolina	Sue Monk Kidd	The Secret Life of Bees
South Dakota	Lee Child	61 Hours
Tennessee	Flannery O’Connor	Wise Blood
Texas	H G Bissinger	Friday Night Lights
Utah	Norman Mailer	The Executioner’s Song
Vermont	Donna Tartt	The Secret History
Virginia	Patricia Cornwell	Body of Evidence
Washington	David Guterson	Snow Falling on Cedars
West Virginia	Homer H Hickam jr	Rocket Boys
Wisconsin	Chad Harbach	The Art of Fielding
Wyoming	Annie Proulx	Close Range: Wyoming Stories