Synopses & Reviews
This part art book, part biography, and part travel guide offers insight into how landscapes and townscapes influenced John Steinbeck's creative process and how, in turn, his legacy has influenced modern California. Various types of readers will appreciate the information in this guideliterary pilgrims will learn more about the state featured so prominently in Steinbeck's work, tourists can visit the same buildings that he lived in and wrote about, and historians will appreciate the engrossing perspective on daily life in early and mid 20th-century California. Offering an entirely new perspective on Steinbeck and the people and places that he brought to life in his writing, this edition includes a wonderful variety of photographs, sketches, and paintings, including some from private, rarely seen collections. With a new preface from the author, updated details on featured websites, a new discussion on Steinbecks ecological interests and activities, and an extended exploration of his many travels to Mexico, readers will find delight in this depiction of the symbiotic relationship between an author and his favorite places.
Review
"Hands down my favorite book about the Nobel Prize winning novelist. It is well researched, informative, jargon-free, and best of all amply illustrated." Robert DeMott, author, Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath, 1938-1941
Review
"The best of both worlds: an insightful and informative travelogue combined with fascinating historical morsels." John C. Turner, general manager, The Clement Monterey Hotel
Review
"You will want to read this edition more than once, and when in Steinbeck country, you will want to refer to it constantly." Jack Benson, author, John Steinbeck, Writer: A Biography
Review
Highly recommended.” Library Journal, on the first edition
About the Author
Susan Shillinglaw is a scholar in residence at the National Steinbeck Center in Salinas, California, and a professor of English at San Jose State University, where she was also the director of the Center for Steinbeck Studies for many years. She was a consultant to Harpo Productions for Oprah's website on East of Eden and has consulted for popular media such as Good Morning America, the Discovery Channel, and A&E. She has written extensively on John Steinbeck and is the coeditor of America and Americans and Selective Nonfiction, Beyond Boundaries: Rereading John Steinbeck, and Steinbeck and the Environment: Interdisciplinary Approaches. She recently completed a biography of Carol Steinbeck and is coediting All Things Steinbeck: An Encyclopedia of Steinbecks World. She lives in Pacific Grove, California. She lives in Pacific Grove, California. Nancy Burnett has been photographing the California landscape for more than 30 years. She is the producer of The Shape of Life and Strange Days on Planet Earth for PBS, coproducer of the photographic exhibit Sea Stars for the Smithsonian, and coauthor of The Shape of Life. She lives in Carmel Valley, California.