Some people choose to be travelers, while others are forced, by neglect and mistreatment, to leave their lives behind, constantly traveling without a home to return to. This story is about a man who was abandoned by his parents, forcing him to ride the rails from town to town, finding work wherever and whenever he can. After young Jake Wagers meets the wayward traveler one afternoon, his life is changed for the better. There are great lessons to be learned from a man who has experienced so much of the world, lessons that will change the way Jake views his own existence. A Muddy Fork Short Story

The Wayward Traveler follows the adventures of Louis, a young American who, in 1985, is determined to travel the world. The story takes place in forty countries and spans ten years. Whether you're a traveller or an arm chair traveller, this book will make you feel the road.

This "follows the adventures of Louis, a young American who, in 1985, is determined to travel the world. The story takes place in forty countries and spans ten years ... Louis feels disenchantment with his former life, and a yearning to understand the foreign lands he encounters on his travels. He's broke most of the time and spends considerable effort trying to get by. Along the way he meets other travelers. He learns about love and compassion, and hate. He befriends a Thai monk and Hindu Sadhu Babas and learns about other ways of thought, and enlightenment. Along the way Louis develops a list of Rules to help him get by, and yet, there's a restlessness to his travels. He continues to wander into new countries, and through it all his Rules save him."--Publisher's website.

250 of the best waterfalls found in North Carolina with full descriptions, comprehensive directions, and four-color photographs.

Includes extracts from diaries, logs and letters, this volume covers 16 centuries of women travellers, starting with Abbess Etheria's 4th-century account of the difficulties of mountaineering on Mount Sinai.

At the height of his fame, Mark Twain, the great writer and humorist from Missouri, was facing financial ruin from one of his failed business ventures. Broke but much loved he embarked on a money-raising lecture tour around the equator, making a stop in Australia. The Wayward Tourist republishes Mark Twain's Australian travel writing in which he recounts impressions of Sydney ('God made the Harbor a but Satan made Sydney') and his view of Australian history ('[it reads] like the most beautiful lies'). In his introduction, Don Watson brilliantly pays homage to America's 'funny man' who brought his swagger, love of language and wicked talent for observation to our shores.

A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR • A “furious and addictive new novel” (The New York Times) about mothers and daughters, and one woman's midlife reckoning as she flees her suburban life. “Exhilarating ... reads like a burning fever dream. A virtuosic, singular and very funny portrait of a woman seeking sanity and purpose in a world gone mad.” —The New York Times Book Review Samantha Raymond's life has begun to come apart: her mother is ill, her teenage daughter is increasingly remote, and at fifty-two she finds herself staring into "the Mids"—that hour of supreme wakefulness between three and four in the morning in which women of a certain age suddenly find themselves contemplating motherhood, mortality, and, in this case, the state of our unraveling nation. When she falls in love with a beautiful, decrepit house in a hardscrabble neighborhood in Syracuse, she buys it on a whim and flees her suburban life—and her family—as she grapples with how to be a wife, a mother, and a daughter, in a country that is coming apart at the seams. Dana Spiotta's Wayward is a stunning novel about aging, about the female body, and about female complexity in contemporary America. Probing and provocative, brainy and sensual, it is a testament to our weird times, to reforms and resistance and utopian wishes, and to the beauty of ruins.

Hal Adhil and Miri Rodgers are best friends. They spend their days working at a small observatory in the Starfall Mountains beyond the metropolis of Anduruna. Miri is the only person Hal trusts to understand a dangerous secret: Hal can see all wavelengths of light. Hal uses his superpower only when they are free from prying eyes that could report them to the authorities. The lives of Hal and Miri quickly change one night, however, when a meteor crashes into the nearby mountains. When they set out to retrieve the fallen star, it quickly becomes apparent that things are not what they seem. What appeared to be an ordinary meteor is in fact a strange power source that Hal and Miri are not the only ones looking for. In order to rescue his closest companion, Hal must not only unravel a mystery that has eluded his people for ages, but also face unsavory characters from his own past. Can Hal, the Wayward Astronomer, harness his supernatural powers to rescue his friend before time runs out?