Our audio series "The Authors Read. We Listen." was originally hatched in a NYC club during BEA back in 2012. It's a fun little series, where authors record themselves reading an excerpt from their own novels, in their own voices, the way their stories were meant to be heard.
Today, Daniel Robinson reads an excerpt from his book Hitchhicking Across America: 1963. Daniel
Robinson is a retired lawyer from California. He has a BA from UC
Riverside, an MA from Stanford, and a JD from McGeorge Law School. He was a
Peace Corps Volunteer in Venezuela from 1966 to 1968. He’s married with two
children and two grandchildren. In August of 1963, he
hitchhiked from Lake Tahoe to Los Angeles, Miami, Washington DC, New York City,
and back to LA. This book is a fictionalized version of that trip.
Click on the soundcloud link below to hear Daniel read a section from this book.
What it's about:
Nick is a nineteen-year-old college student at UC Berkeley who quits his Lake Tahoe summer job to see America and meet Americans, face-to-face, hitching rides from Tahoe to Los Angeles, New Orleans, Miami, New York City, and points in-between.
He witnesses Jim Crow segregation in the South. He meets Yvonne, the daughter of a Palm Beach socialite. He learns something unexpected about his mother from his Aunt Rose's family photo album. World War II vets pick him up and tell him about their war experience and how it affects their current lives. He meets Oliver, a civil rights activist in Mississippi, and Gina, an aspiring Olympic swimmer, and Lorena, an aging silent film star in Palm Springs. He consoles Rosa, a young Mexican woman who has committed a mortal sin.
Hitchhiking Across America: 1963 by Daniel Robinson is about how America is changing. World War II, Civil rights, Vietnam, social mores, McCarthyism...all these things play a role.
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