Neil Young Nation.

Ann Turner is Financial and Budget Manager at the University of British
Columbia Library.

Novelist Kevin Chong has idealized popular music legend Neil Young since he was a kid, and it comes as a shock to realize that Young, approaching 60, is no longer young. Kevin, himself approaching the milestone age of 30, commemorates his idol and takes one last kick at youth with a road trip. Kevin and three buddies set off by car to retrace Neil Young’s career-shaping journeys from Winnipeg to Sault Ste. Marie, on to Toronto, and across the United States to Los Angeles. Along the way they visit places significant in Young’s life and career, talk to people who know or know of him, and reminisce. The trip winds up at Neil Young’s 2004 Farm Aid concert in Auburn, Washington. While there is a lot of Neal Young biography scattered through this book—it includes a bibliography and a selected discography—it still is very much about Kevin and his friends. They’re a lively lot, and the travelogue is hilarious at times, but is mixed with nostalgia as the young men traverse not only the continent but also the passage from youth to the responsibilities of adulthood. It makes a great read.