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 enlarge | Author: Bill Bryson
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
Buy Used: $1.00
You Save: $13.95 (93%)
New (65) Used (137) Collectible (11) from $1.00
Avg. Customer Rating:  286 reviews
Sales Rank: 6339
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.9
ISBN: 0060920084
Dewey Decimal Number: 917.30492
EAN: 9780060920081
ASIN: 0060920084
Publication Date: September 12, 1990
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Condition: used-remainder mark on page edges-pages 155-170 have corner torn off-cover and some pages are creased-back cover and last few pages have large slices from unpacking
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| Customer Reviews:
 The Lost Continent..are we there yet? September 2, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Originally published on SensiblySassy.blogspot.com
Lost Continent:
Well a couple years ago I read Bill Bryson's book Neither Here nor There and it was a hilarious guide through Europe. So when I saw Lost Continent on the shelves I instantly wanted to read about Bill's road trip through the U.S. Within the first five pages I was chuckling to myself and out loud. (Luckily Jon was the only one sitting next to me on the plane as I read) By the time the hour and a half flight touched back down on the ground I had polished off quite a few pages.
As the book went on I began to feel less enamored with the book than I initially had. The tone shifted from funny to cranky as the trip/book wore on. Now I wonder if it is the fact that the trip began to take its toll on Bryson or if he felt that crotchety was a good tone for him to switch to-we may never know. Overall if you were to sample some of Bryson's work I would absolutley recommend Neither Here nor There over Lost Continent . Neither Here nor There gives you a hilarious and personal guide through Europe whereas Lost Continent really helps you remember what it was like to take loooong car rides with your parents-the good and the bad.
 satisfied my curiosity towards small towns August 30, 2007
We all know what big cities are like, but how about small towns? Of course Bill Bryson did not (& obviously could not) visit all small towns in his home country, this book satisfied my curiosity towards small towns in America.
I guess there's always irresistible charm of overland travel, and Bryson described his overland trip with hilarious writing style.
One suggestion: if the editor could add a route map at the beginning of book showing Bryson's itinerary, it would be even better.
A bumpy, yet scenic, road August 3, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Bill Bryson, a child of the 50s, used to spend each summer with his family on one of those all-American vacations that consisted of endless driving, sweltering heat and the inevitable destination that was, due to his father's preference, free and educational. He always longed for the chance to buy tacky hats with plastic crap on them and other tasteless souvenirs, and now that he's an adult, he finally gets that chance when he embarks on a nation-wide odyssey in the hopes of getting to know the country he left behind in The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America.
Although he was born in Des Moines, Illinois ("Someday had to," he explains on the opening page), Bryson's heart was elsewhere, and he spent most of his adult life living in England. Some 30 years after those summer journeys he's back in the states, and with no specific itinerary or time constraints, he leisurely passes from town to city, looking for the perfect place that survived from his childhood in this travelogue.
Of course, America has changed since Bryson's childhood days, and instead of finding Perfect Town, U.S.A, he encounters a deluge of faceless shopping malls, unremarkable villages and far too many gas stations. His hilarious observations usually come at the expense of the people he talks to and places he visits, which almost seems to suggest an air of British snootiness that he picked up from his years living abroad. Still, there are plenty of irreverent comments ("I only ever knew one journalist with a truly tidy desk, and he was eventually arrested for molesting small boys. Make of that what you will; but just bear it in mind that next time somebody with a tidy desk invites you camping") that are just so outlandishly amusing, that it's easy to forgive him for his treatment of the occasional small town citizen.
Traveling across America and being disgusted with the over-commercialization is hardly groundbreaking material. John Steinbeck, the quintessential American, did exactly that in 1962 with Travels with Charley: In Search of America. While Steinbeck is a folksy, talkative guy, Bryson instead bares his teeth. He travels alone and all along the way he doesn't strike up many conversations aside from brief chats with a plethora of waitresses and moronic country folk. He does meet up with a friend, and later a niece, but they're pushed into the background and the surroundings become the main characters. The closest we get to travel companions is when Bryson vividly describes what the past trips with his family were like. His mom says nothing other than "Would you like a sandwich, honey?" and "I don't know, dear."
Much of Bryson's journey on both coasts, and everything in between, brings up plenty woeful places, yet he does find some attractions worthy of his admiration. A rare few of the stops on his trip nostalgically remind him of his youth, from the sheer scope of the Grand Canyon ("Your mind, unable to deal with anything on this scare, just shuts down and for many long moments you are a human vacuum") and the "sleepy" college town of Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania ("You feel at first as if you should be wearing slippers and a bathrobe"). Bryson covers so much ground (38 states) and visits so many similar towns, that at times, his travelogue almost read like a list. Even the memorable places are often described as simply "pleasant," and after a paragraph, it's off to the next destination. Like the long road trip that Bryson embarks on, The Lost Continent captures the vastness and monotony of driving across America. Because of the now-famous Bill Bryson humor, for most of it works well and there are plenty of laughs, The Lost Continent becomes more than another lackluster expressway town.
 I loved this book July 19, 2007
I loved this book. Part of the reason why I loved this book is because I drive in my car every year out west from Buffalo, NY. I also have taken many car trips in the eastern part of the country. When I go on these driving trips I do it because I am reaching a destination to do some hiking and or climbing.
I thought the idea of this book was great of Mr. Bryson trying to find the perfect town in small town America. The humor that Mr. Bryson has is terrific. In the end Mr. Bryson has a greater appreciation for the area of the country, which he originally comes from after exploring much of the country in his vehicle.
I thought this book was very funny because it makes humor out of many American types of things. It also is a good representation of what life is like on the road. Part of the reason why I enjoyed this book so much was because I have traveled a lot of this country by car and seen many small towns. This book does offer so many interesting pieces of information throughout it. I would recommend this book to anyone that has traveled the road and seen many small towns in America. I would also recommend this book to anyone that appreciates Mr. Bryson's humor.
Funny In Spots ... July 18, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I got this book from a book-swapping club and thought, since I love travel stories, I would definitely enjoy this one. I have not heard of Bill Bryson before and thought, oh, a traveling memoir ... it's perfect for summer (and for the lull before the Harry Potter storm, of which I am very anxiously waiting for the last book ...). This book is funny ~~ if you like juvenile potty humor. I have to be in the mood for it. I was in the mood for it. Normally, I am not in the mood for it since it is crude and distasteful in my opinion (which doesn't really matter much anyways!).
There is one big big gripe about this book. He totally dissed on Ohio. Well, duh. If you only travel the turnpike in Ohio up to I-75 ~~ yeah, you're not going to find anything remotely attractive about the interstates. On page 172 of my book, he mentioned that he "awoke early and experienced the sinking senation that overcomes you when you first open your eyes and realize that instead of a normal day ahead of you, with its scatterings of simple gratifications, you are going to have a day without even the tiniest of pleasures; you are going to drive across Ohio." He must have never taken a childhood vacation in Ohio. I've been through Iowa and had strep throat in his hometown of Des Moines on our way back from the Rockies ~~ all I can say is that Des Moines is fortunate enough to have a Steak and Shake because I was dying of pain and they have the best milk shakes ... and a great book store too. I'd like to point out to Mr. Bryson that he needs to check out Ohio again ~~ this time, travel on the backroads. It is a beautiful state ~~ one of the nicests in the good ol' USA.
I digress. Other than the dissing of my home state, he was funny in all respects of his travels. But after awhile, you can only make fun of the people in different states for so long and after awhile, you start wishing he'd stay in places longer than a night or for a cup of coffee. Then you wish for a more indepth book on traveling stories ... but it's not that kind of book, so it is disappointing when you find out that he's just going to make fun of the natives across America. He is funny but then he isn't funny. You just have to read this book to know what I mean. However, he sure hit the RV travelers dead on! When I worked at Yellowstone National Park in my youth, we called those tourists, tourons simply because they're tourists and morons at the same time. Not very nice, I know, but I was very young. Bryson's comments about the tourists were right on though and did make me laugh.
I am not rushing out to buy another Bill Bryson book because this is the first one I've read and I am not sure if it's worth the money to read him again. But then again, I might give him another chance ~~ but hopefully, his tastes have matured to where he's actually funny and insightful, instead of funny and juvenile.
7-18-07
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