By Tom Zoellner
This was a book club selection. I didn’t read much of the description before starting it. As it started, I expected more of a love letter to the author’s home state. It is not that. It is highly critical of Arizona’s past and present. I don’t mind that, I just didn’t think that’s what I was getting.
Halfway through, one note that stuck out the most: Arizonans spend the least amount of time with their neighbors. Apparently the state attracts and contains a lot of solitary folks who just want to be left alone. As the author follows that thread, it’s not surprising that we’ve had the political fiascos that we’ve had. We’re not an open nor communal bunch.
The other most surprising note was that Arizona has (or had at the time of writing) the 12th oldest population in the USA. In section about Sun City and retirement communities of AZ, I thought the state would actually be older than that.
The book ends with the author in Mexico at the site where the territory was given its name. He reflects on his hike, his lived experiences, and what he studied of Arizona history. It concludes with something that sounds more like the love letter that I expected, but the journey was mostly a rough one: political corruption, massacres of the natives, endless sprawling stucco and strip malls, drying forests ready to burn, mining destroying the land and polluting the water, natural flows of water diverted and dried up, xenophobia, racism, and unrelenting heat killing migrants. Oof.