Northland

Northland: A 4,000-Mile Journey Along America’s Forgotten Border
Porter Fox
W. W. Norton & Company (July 3, 2018), 272 pages
Kindle edition $12.99, Amazon hardcover $19.86

I haven’t read a travel book in a while, so it was a pleasure to delve into this one.

The book focuses on the border between the United States and Canada. Fox writes of his own travel along the border, moving east to west. He also includes a substantial amount of history, and even current events.

He describes how long it took for the border to be agreed upon and about how errors in mapping and surveying put the border in the wrong place at various locations for extended periods of time. Political considerations played a role as well. He goes into considerable detail about his visit to the Standing Rock protest of the Dakota Access pipeline.

Fox also writes about how the events of 9/11 and how the current administration’s attitude towards immigration have made border crossings much less pleasant than they were in previous years.

Porter Fox is a skilled writer and as travel books go Northland is one of the better ones.