The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan-American Highway

Here is a wonderful, very entertaining page-turner from a heavy-weight writer/screen writer, Teresa Bruce. It is a combination of a travelogue and memoir, and it’s written so well that it’s hard to put it down. The Ride takes the reader through her and her husband’s trip on the Pan-American Highway with a one-ton truck and vintage restored trailer. Through fifty-one short chapters, Bruce describes both the trip and her childhood memories, each one of which is a little adventure, a little story by itself. She is a born story-teller, captivating readers paragraph after paragraph. In this trip, she is retracing a similar one her father took thirty years prior. Each chapter starts with a small black-and-white photo (this reviewer only has an advanced-proof copy). Too bad there are no captions with the photos. Bruce brings the scenery alive along the highway while traveling through Mexico, Guatemala, Bolivia, and all the way south to Argentina. Part of the journey is guided by her mother’s diary. You can finish this book in a few days, but you will enjoy it even more if savoring it a few chapters at a time over weeks.