This book is an odd combination of road trip/art critique. The road trip part is funny and entertaining as the reader accompanies Erin Hogan on her quest through the Southwest for land art. The author becomes a very real person as she struggles with traveling alone in desolate and sometimes hostile (in a physical sense) areas of the country. The art critique part of the book was not as much fun as the road trip, but helped the reader see these amazing forms through the eyes of someone with training in art. I was frustrated by her references to artists that I did not know. I was reading the book without a computer available to google artists, so I was a bit frustrated because I could not process her comparisons. She assumes that the reader has a working knowledge of a body of art and literature that I do not know. I would have liked to have had my hand held a little in this department. I did enjoy her reference to James Elkin's writing about how art moves us and her discussion about that topic. I would, however, have liked to have had a reference back to that topic after she saw Lightning Field at sunrise. She liked it, she had a great experience, she got involved physically in the piece, but did it move her to tears? That would seem to be a good yardstick by which to measure. The book was a good read...I'm dying to go to Marfa, but I think it was not as well written as it could have been....maybe more time spent editing and tying up the loose ends would have been prudent.

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This was the best book of 2008. Erin is witty and charming. I loved this book.

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