The Meadowlands: Wilderness Adventures on the Edge of a City

In one of his travels in the Meadowlands, Robert Sullivan is picked up by a Secaucus animal control officer who tells him, "If you dig out here, you sure as heck are going to find something." That's the issue of the book: Sullivan digs--literally and figuratively--for the secret knowledge, history, and treasures of the Meadowlands. This is a very funny book and there were many parts that made me laugh out loud. I won't spoil them here. Sullivan is a good writer and this reminded me of Charles Portis's masterpiece The Dog of the South--and if you've ever read that, you know this is high praise.

If you ever took the train through Secaucus and wanted to get out and canoe away through the channels in the reeds, or counted the snowy egrets standing on half-drowned telegraph poles, or dreamed of living at the little camp right at the mouth of the tunnel to Penn Station ... read this. It's pretty perfect.

A journey into the swampy area of New Jersey five miles outside of Manhattan--widely considered to among the least attractive locales in the country--describes its memorable characters, corpses, and pollution. 20,000 first printing.