Dream State: Eight Generations of Swamp Lawyers, Conquistadors, Confederate Daughters, Banana Republicans, and Other Florida Wildlife (Paperback)

Diane Roberts (author)

£16.95

Paperback 368 Pages / Published: 30/11/2006

Publisher out of stock

Currently unavailable to order

Synopsis

Part family memoir, part political commentary, part apologia, "Dream State" tells the grand and sometimes crazy story of Florida through the eyes of one of its native daughters. Acclaimed journalist and NPR commentator, Diane Roberts has many family secrets to tell. Roberts' ancestors helped settle Florida, kill off its pesky Indians, enslave some of its inhabitants, clear its forests, lay its train tracks, and pave its roads, all the time weaving themselves into the very fabric of the state. With a storyteller's talent for setting great scenes, Roberts lays out the sweeping history of eight generations of Browards and Bradfords, Tuckers and Robertses. From Florida's first inhabitants to those involved in the recent past with the botched presidential election of 2000, Roberts renders them all with a deep, familial affection. While exposing the real people whom Carl Hiaasen and Elmore Leonard have been fictionalizing for years, "Dream State" ultimately reveals the cogs and wheels that make the state tick.

Publisher: University Press of Florida
ISBN: 9780813030364
Number of pages: 368
Weight: 499 g
Dimensions: 229 x 152 x 20 mm
Edition: Reissue ed.

MEDIA REVIEWS

Robert Olen Butler, author of "Had a Good Time: Stories from American Postcards"

"Dream State" is a wild and wiggly book that has no clear precedent, just as Diane Roberts' fascinating and all-comprehending and wicked mind has no precedent. And she writes the sweetest, twitchiest, funniest, smartest prose you're likely to find. This book captures the juicy essence of Florida, but it also speaks to the essence of this so-far bizarre twenty-first century, which rose up from some serious swamps and where all our chads are still dangling.