New York Situations bestselling writer of The Wordy Shipmates and contributor to NPR’s ‘This American Life’ Sarah Vowell embarks on the road trip to sites of political violence, from Washington DC to Alaska, to raised understand our nation’s ever-evolving politics system and background.

Sarah Vowell exposes the glorious conundrums of American history and tradition with wit, probity, and an irreverent love of life. With Assassination Vacation, she takes us on the street trip like no various other — a journey to about Assassination Holiday the pit halts of American political murder and through the myriad methods they have been useful for fun and revenue, for politics and cultural advantage.

From Buffalo to Alaska, Washington towards the Dry Tortugas, Vowell visits locations immortalized and affected by the spilling of politically essential blood, reporting as she complements her trademark mixture of wisecracking humor, remarkable honesty, and thought-provoking criticism. We find out about the jinx that was Robert Todd Lincoln (present in the assassinations of Presidents Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley) and see the politicking that proceeded to go into the producing of the Lincoln Memorial. The producing narrative is much more than an interesting and beneficial travelogue — it’s the disturbing and fascinating story of how American death has been manipulated by popular culture, including books, structures, sculpture, and — the author’s favorite — historical tourism. Though the themes of loss and violence are explored and we make detours to observe how the Republican Party became the Republican Party, there are all types of lighter diversions along the way into the lives of the three presidents and their assassins, including mummies, display tunes, mean-spirited totem poles, and a nineteenth-century biblical sex cult.