As the 1970s begin to recede into history, sportswriter Steve Rushin reflects on the era of road trips in a wood-paneled station wagon, with the kids in the way-back, singing along to the Steve Miller Band. Here too are memories of Saturday morning cartoons, Bic pens, lightsabers, and those oh-so-coveted Schwinn Sting-Ray bikes. Stealing the show here is Rushin's sharply witty father—one of 3M's greatest and last eight-track salesmen—traveling on the brand-new Boeing 747, providing for his family but wanting nothing more than to get home.

"Elegiac…. What makes the book more than just late-baby-boomer nostalgia is the writing, which is knowing and funny."—NPR