Walking to Listen : Bloomsbury : 9781632867018 : 163286701X : 12 Jul 2018 : A memoir of one young man's coming-of-age on a cross-country trek--told through the stories of the people of all ages, races, and inclinations he meets along the highways of America. At twenty-three, Andrew Forsthoefel walked out the back door of his home in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, with a backpack, an audio recorder, his copies of Whitman and Rilke, and a sign that read walking to listen. He had just graduated from Middlebury College and was ready to begin his adult life, but he didn't know how. So he decided he'd walk. And listen. It would be a cross-country quest for guidance, and everyone he met would be his guide. Walking toward the Pacific, he faced an Appalachian winter and a Mojave summer. He met beasts inside: fear, loneliness, doubt. But he also encountered incredible kindness from strangers. Thousands shared their stories with him, sometimes confiding their prejudices, too. Often he didn't know h