A review by quietdomino
Vacationland: True Stories from Painful Beaches by John Hodgman

I think I have to be recused from rating this book, since it is (in some part) about being in your 40s, spending time in Western Massachusetts (among other places), and reckoning with the death of a parent, and I have (recently and not so recently) been doing all of those things, at some points all at the same time. This makes me a little too likely to be overwhelmed by nostalgia for the (gross) Indian souvenir shops on the Mohawk Trail and very unlikely to give unbiased reviews to this book. Still, I deeply enjoyed reading Vacationland and also enjoyed Hodgman's kind and thoughtful authorial presence, and I think the things he says about mortality and joy are acutely true. And so I am grateful to have had the chance to remember that drive on Route 2 over the mountains through the darkness one more (surely not one last) time.
P.S. some of the book is also about Maine, apparently.