William Least Heat-Moon
William Least Heat-Moon is a curious man with a talent for relating the things he’s learned. It’s a winning combination. “Roads to Quoz” is made up of several reports on his rambles: a trip along the Ouachita River in Arkansas, conversations with a woman who lives so simply that her “carbon footprint was that of a cat”, the story of a man dedicated to photographing all of US Highway 40, and more. This is a book, circuitous, fat and with a leisurely pace, that the reader can sink into. When the author says “mosey” he really means it.
Though it’s not strictly a travel book, it has the prime characteristic of great travel books, namely, a narrator you want to spend time with. Heat-Moon comes across as the kind of person you’d like to find yourself next to on a long train ride.
By the way, “quoz” is, according to Heat-Moon an archaic term for anything “strange, incongruous, or peculiar”.