Rim to River

Tom Zoellner is a fifth-generation Arizonan, former staff writer for the Arizona Republic, and the author of eight nonfiction books, including Island on Fire, which won the 2020 National Book Critics Circle Award.

“Tom Zoellner has the legs of Muir, the heart of Steinbeck, the eyes of Didion, the pen of Caro, and the scope of Gibbons as he takes readers beyond the stereotypes of a state too often cast as just one big, bad waste of desert. Masterful must-read.”—Gustavo Arellano, author of Orange County: A Personal History and Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America“Exquisitely written, each footstep in this pilgrimage connects inspirational vistas to complicated histories through research, interviews, and conversations in a quest to find Arizona’s heart.”—Lydia Otero, author of In the Shadows of the Freeway: Growing Up Brown and Queer and La Calle: Spatial Conflicts and Urban Renewal in a Southwest City“At last, a superbly well-informed and insightful writer takes on the whole enchilada of Arizona—history, cultures, landscapes, politics, economy, bars, restaurants, weather, loneliness, belligerent crackpots, and more. Zoellner, a native son, walks the length of the state and tackles the big questions that Arizonans struggle with: Who are we? What is this place? How did it get this way?”—Richard Grant, author of The Deepest South of All: True Stories from Natchez, Mississippi“Zoellner’s greatest gift is his agile and adroit use of the same words you have read hundreds of times combined in new ways. From lofty musings to descriptions of a washtub, his storytelling brims with discovery.”—Lisa Schnebly Heidinger, author of Arizona: 100 Years Grand and Tucson: The Old Pueblo“In Rim to River, Zoellner interweaves his hike along the Arizona Trail from Utah to Sonora with stories about the history and culture of the state. It is a journey well worth taking with him, a travelogue about an ancient and unforgiving land where humans have desecrated its beauty and sucked Pleistocene aquifers lower and lower through a series of boom-and-bust economies that never seem to last and never seem to end. A place where the contrast between the stark grandeur of the landscape and the tawdry creations of our contemporary society bounces back and forth with an energy that often seems obscene until you realize how transient those creations are.”—Thomas E. Sheridan, author of Arizona: A History, Revised EditionPraise for Tom Zoellner“[A] dazzling display of intrepid reporting.”—Entertainment Weekly“The author is expert with vivid prose.”—Publishers Weekly“Zoellner is both a first-rate reporter with years of newspaper and magazine work behind him and a skilled stylist who makes you want to come back for more.”—Kirkus Reviews“Tom Zoellner is one of my go-to authors. He has a clear eye, a deep soul, and a very sharp pen.”—Luis Alberto Urrea, author of The House of Broken Angels and The Devil’s Highway“Tom Zoellner writes like a dream and thinks like the best kind of realist—the kind whose truth-telling is infused with fundamental compassion, implicit empathy, and genuine curiosity.”—Meghan Daum, author of The Problem with Everything: My Journey Through the New CultureWars“To get where we’re going, we need to know where we’ve gone, and Tom Zoellner is the best guide for our times that I know of.”—Ben Fountain, author of Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk