The Ghosts Who Travel with Me: A Literary Pilgrimage Through Brautigan's America

The road novel and the road memoir each have a long literary history, possibly because a journey is what narrative is often about. The exterior journey mirrors the interior one. The Ghosts Who Travel with Me is a compelling and reflective addition to this canon. Green, along with her companion, Arline, decide to make an expedition, looking for their inner quintessence, by taking to the road inspired by Richard Brautigan's Trout Fishing in America. It's a simple premise--using the late hippie writer's novel as a map--but what Green does with it is a small miracle. This narrative--this trip--is full of wistful good humor, personal history, musings on literature and life, hard truths, self-examination, and maybe even a little illumination, a little hippie satori. I loved the read. It's Brautiganesque, without leaning too hard on its source novel, and Green is a canny tour guide. She says, "It's hard to stop the wheels once they're turning." It's also hard to stop these pages turning, and you might want to travel this road with her more than once.--Corey Mesler
Allison Green's The Ghosts Who Travel with Me takes readers on a nostalgic road trip through Idaho, where Green traces the steps of her childhood literary hero, Richard Brautigan. As Green examines her early fascination with Brautigan, she also unearths the complexities of the decade into which she was born--the sixties. Readers need not be a child of the sixties or a fan of Brautigan to appreciate this book. As she delights us with her rich explorations, Green leads us to examine how we are all shaped--and perhaps even haunted--by our earliest influences.--Melanie Hoffert
The Ghosts Who Travel with Me is full of whimsy and insight, its spirit resonating with Richard Brautigan's peculiar and delightful sensibility. One of the many pleasures of reading this book is imagining what Brautigan himself would make of it--surely he would appreciate it as a kind of homage; more importantly, its rich and intelligent navigations would show him so much about what has changed and what has stayed the same in the world he left behind.--Peter Rock
I can't think of a wiser, craftier, kinder travel companion than Allison Green. Yet for as much fun as I had reading The Ghosts Who Travel with Me, I also found myself challenged and provoked and asked to grapple with the legacies of my own ancestors, literary and otherwise. The Ghosts Who Travel with Me will keep you thinking, and feeling, long after you turn the last page.--Joe Wilkins
Charming, wry, and elliptical. The Ghosts Who Travel with Me takes readers on a humorous and deeply nostalgic tour of America, and plumbs the depths of "Generation Jones." Vastly entertaining.--Diana Abu-Jaber

In this lovely articulation of the transformative power of literature, Allison Green has found her voice.

--Jayne Guertin