British journalist Steve Boggan spent a full month following a ten-dollar bill around the US. He started it on its journey in Lebanon, Kansas -- since that small farming town is, by some calculations, the geographic center of the US -- and every time it was passed along to a new person, he'd tag along with them until they spent it. Rather surprisingly, he was able to do this successfully, and eventually ended up in Detroit. Along the way, he met a lot of extremely nice and astonishingly accommodating people, did a bit of sightseeing, and worried constantly about how he was going to get his clothes washed.

It's a pleasant enough little travelog, but it's also one that feels... kind of pointless. Even Boggan doesn't seem at all clear on why he's doing it or what exactly he's getting out of it. Maybe that's a little unfair, though. Maybe an attempt to impose some sort of coherent theme or narrative onto the experience would have been too artificial, and it works just fine as a small, random glimpse into life in the US heartland, especially for readers across the Pond. In any case, I found it a quick, decent read, but not a particularly insightful or memorable one.

Rating: 3.5/5

(Note: I won a copy of this through Early Reviewers a couple of years ago, and the publishers never bothered to send the book. I do hold this against them, rather -- to the extent that I don't think I would have bought a copy if I hadn't found it dirt cheap in a discount catalog -- but I've tried not to hold it against the author.) ( )