The New York Times Book Review - Arlie Russell Hochschild
In this stunning and beautifully written book, Bruder…describes her journey with Linda and her other interviews conducted in five states over three years…[a] brilliant and haunting book…
The New York Times - Parul Sehgal
…an important…work influenced by such classics of immersion journalism as Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed…Bruder is a poised and graceful writer.
Publishers Weekly - Audio
★ 01/22/2018
Actor White engages listeners in Bruder’s sociological study of a group of low-income, mostly white elderly Americans who travel from job to job in RVs to avoid the cost of a permanent home. These are men and women in their 60s, 70s, and even 80s who consider themselves not homeless but houseless, having lost their homes or opted to ditch their mortgages, taxes, and repair bills. Listeners will feel as if they are right there in Bruder’s passenger seat, traveling with her to RV campsites, researching, and sharing grief and friendship with the “workampers.” Among the people profiled is 64-year-old Linda May, who lives in a tiny trailer she calls the Squeeze Inn—“yeah, there’s room, squeeze in”—and works as a “host” in trailer camps registering newcomers, repairing RVs, and cleaning toilets all day. She then heads to Amazon warehouses for long, exhausting night shifts sorting packages. White’s friendly voice and easygoing conversational rhythm embeds listeners in the misery but also the camaraderie of these under-the-radar 21st-century nomads. A Norton hardcover. (Oct.)
Publishers Weekly
05/29/2017
Journalist Bruder (Burning Book) expands on an article originally published in Harper’s where she examined the phenomenon of aging Americans adjusting to an economic climate in which they can’t afford to retire. Many among them have discarded “stick and brick” traditional homes for “wheel estate” in the form of converted vans and RVs and have formed a nomadic culture of “workampers,” evoking the desperate resourcefulness of those who lived through the Great Depression. Bruder follows her subjects as they harvest sugar beets, work at Amazon fulfillment centers during the holidays, and act as campground hosts. She conducts extensive interviews, attends the workampers’ gatherings, and tests out survival tips, to the point where she makes “houselessness”—a lifestyle born out of necessity and compromise—seem like a new form of freedom, with its own kind of appeal. Of course, she also addresses the often-crushing financial and social circumstances in which these people live, and pointedly touches on the racial considerations that make this nomadic lifestyle a predominantly white trend. Tracing individuals throughout their journeys from coast to coast, Bruder conveys the phenomenon’s human element, making this sociological study intimate, personal, and entertaining, even as the author critiques the economic factors behind the trend. Agent: Joy Harris, Joy Harris Literary Agency. (Sept.)
Buffalo News - Peter Simon
"Bruder tells [this] story with gripping insight, detail and candor. In the hands of a fine writer, this is a terrific profile of a subculture that gets little attention, or is treated by the media as a quirky hobby, rather than a survival strategy."
Arlie Russell Hochschild
"Stunning and beautifully written. . . brilliant and haunting"
The Nation - Astra Taylor
"At once wonderfully humane and deeply troubling, the book offers an eye-opening tour of the increasingly unequal, unstable, and insecure future our country is racing toward."
The New Yorker - Margaret Talbot
"A remarkable book of immersive reporting.…Bruder is an acute and compassionate observer."
Timothy R. Smith
"[A] devastating, revelatory book."
New York Times - Parul Sehgal
"“Bruder is a poised and graceful writer.”"
Barbara Ehrenreich
"In the early twentieth century, men used to ride the rails in search of work, sharing camps at night. Today, as Bruder brilliantly reports, we have a new class of nomadic workers who travel in their RVs from one short-term job to another. There’s a lot to cringe at here—from low pay and physically exhausting work to constant insecurity. But surprisingly, Nomadland also offers its residents much-needed camaraderie and adventure, which makes this book a joy to read."
Ted Conover
"The campsite as the home of last resort, the RV used not for vacation but for survival: these are the makings of a new dystopia. Nomadland is a smart road book for the new economy, full of conviviality and dark portent."
San Francisco Chronicle
"A first-rate piece of immersive journalism."
Louise Erdrich
"You will never forget the people whose stories Bruder tells. Proud, resourceful, screwed-over, funny and in so many ways admirable, the American nomads Bruder lived with and reports on have sometimes lost everything but their bravado . . . . [She] tells their stories with humanity and wit."
Minneapolis Star Tribune - Kim Ode
"[I]mportant, eye-opening journalism."
Pacific Standard - Peter C. Baker
"Some readers will come because they're enamored of road narratives, but Bruder's study should be of interest to anyone who cares about the future of work, community, and retirement."
Rebecca Solnit
"People who thought the 2008 financial collapse was over a long time ago need to meet the people Jessica Bruder got to know in this scorching, beautifully written, vivid, disturbing (and occasionally wryly funny) book. Nomadland is a testament both to the generosity and creativity of the victims of our modern-medieval economy, hidden in plain sight, and to the blunt-end brutality that put them there. Is this the best the wealthiest nation on earth can do for those who’ve already done so much?"
starred review Booklist
"[A] powerhouse of a book. . . . In the best immersive-journalism tradition, Bruder records her misadventures driving and living in a van. . . . Visceral and haunting reporting."
O Magazine
"Stirring reportage."
Library Journal - Audio
★ 11/15/2017
Bruder (Burning Book) explores the relatively recent phenomenon of older citizens who find it necessary to continue working in order to make ends meet. These seniors live in RVs and travel across the country in search of temp jobs. Bruder spent three years and 15,000 miles to work alongside elder temps in a sugar beet-processing facility and an Amazon fulfillment warehouse. She explains various reasons why "Workampers" face this harsh reality, including poor or no retirement planning, no pension or IRA funds, minimal social security benefits, if any, chronic illnesses with no medical insurance, and market crashes. She also summarizes key economic data that reflect these rapidly increasing new nationwide "Hoovervilles." Bruder focuses on Amazon's "CamperForce" of nearly 80,000 temps who will be hired in the 2017 holiday shopping season. The low-paying, arduous jobs for them come with no benefits and require constant lifting, bending, squatting, and walking on concrete for ten- to 12-hour shifts. VERDICT Karen White's clearly enunciated, steady-paced narration nicely relates this densely packed information that is essential for all public libraries, especially those in communities experiencing this phenomenon. ["A must-read that is simultaneously hopeless and uplifting and certainly unforgettable": LJ 7/17 starred review of the Norton hc.]—Dale Farris, Groves, TX
Library Journal
★ 07/01/2017
What do you do when your mortgage is underwater, when a divorce or medical catastrophe depletes your savings, or when your anticipated retirement becomes financially impossible? A growing number of Americans address these crushing challenges by taking to the road, with an RV, van, or even a small car as their permanent home. Journalist Bruder joined these contemporary nomads, known as van-dwellers or "workampers." She closely follows Linda, in her mid-60s and traveling between jobs at an Amazon warehouse and a park campground. Linda and her growing "vanily" (van-dweller family) run the gamut of ages and backstories, though there is a preponderance of older people who are unable to retire and work physically strenuous, low-wage jobs to get by. Bruder touches on the deep social stigma of homelessness (van-dwellers fiercely reject that description), the surprisingly short history of the concept of retirement, the rarity of van-dwellers of color, and strategies for docking in plain sight in urban areas and finding a safe haven in rural areas. The people she meets exhibit pride, grit, resourcefulness, resilience, and, profoundly, the elation of freedom mingled with the terror of being one mechanical breakdown away from ruin. VERDICT A must-read that is simultaneously hopeless and uplifting and certainly unforgettable.—Janet Ingraham Dwyer, State Lib. of Ohio, Columbus
JANUARY 2018 - AudioFile
This audiobook explores a subculture of Americans who have taken to life on the road in response to financial stress. Don’t call them homeless, though; these nomads, most of them victims of the disappearing middle class, prefer “houseless.” Author Jessica Bruder immersed herself in their world for three years and reports in depth on the positives and negatives of such a lifestyle. Karen White’s narration is capable, if a little mechanical. She doesn’t hit as many emotional beats as one would expect with a story that is, at its heart, about people struggling for survival. The overall result is still a fine piece of journalism—but one that doesn’t fully capture its own humanist spirit. A.T.N. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2017-05-09
Journalist Bruder (Burning Book: A Visual History of Burning Man, 2007) expands her remarkable cover story for Harper's into a book about low-income Americans eking out a living while driving from locale to locale for seasonal employment.From the beginning of her immersion into a mostly invisible subculture, the author makes it clear that the nomads—many of them senior citizens—refuse to think of themselves as "homeless." Rather, they refer to themselves as "houseless," as in no longer burdened by mortgage payments, repairs, and other drawbacks, and they discuss "wheel estate" instead of real estate. Most of them did not lose their houses willingly, having fallen victim to mortgage fraud, job loss, health care debt, divorce, alcoholism, or some combination of those and additional factors. As a result, they sleep in their cars or trucks or cheaply purchased campers and try to make the best of the situation. At a distance, the nomads might be mistaken for RV owners traveling the country for pleasure, but that is not the case. Bruder traveled with some of the houseless for years while researching and writing her book. She builds the narrative around one especially accommodating nomad, senior citizen Linda May, who is fully fleshed on the page thanks to the author's deep reporting. May and her fellow travelers tend to find physically demanding, low-wage jobs at Amazon.com warehouses that aggressively seek seasonal workers or at campgrounds, sugar beet harvest sites, and the like. The often desperate nomads build communities wherever they land, offering tips for overcoming common troubles, sharing food, repairing vehicles, counseling each other through bouts of depression, and establishing a grapevine about potential employers. Though very little about Bruder's excellent journalistic account offers hope for the future, an ersatz hope radiates from within Nomadland: that hard work and persistence will lead to more stable situations. Engaging, highly relevant immersion journalism.
