The Last Great Road Bum: A Novel

A travel story about Joe, a guy who didn’t cook or spend money in restaurants. Joe is one of many idealistic Americans who went dictator ruled countries in Central America to help ordinary people regain some control over their lives. He slept on the ground and was buried in it too. An entertaining read.

What a title. What a story line. I was sold, without reading sample or review -- certain it was a well paced, outright adventure.Or was it ? I quickly found it to be something else entirely. Written in a style more fitting to a Victorian novel -- heavy, slow, and excessively wordy. The story is interesting, but often seems dulled or lost in the literary clutter. The original notes were written in this manner, and unfortunately the book's creator followed the same style. Not a good fit for a story of adventure. It did improve somewhat as it went along. But still heavy, and a bit of work to read. I must admit to some serious skimming and skipping to make it to the end.Reading a sample before buying is always a good idea -- but in this case, absolutely necessary.

Great read, especially if one has done a little bit of traveling or imagined themselves as a more carefree type of road bum.Those reviews complaining of the writing style may want to pay a little more attention and appreciate the effort that the author has made to remain true to the original stylings of Joe Sanderson's writing, allowing the reader to get a whiff of what his actual novels must have been like. It's also a little bizarre to pick up a book about a "road bum" and expect perfect, stylized prose. It's a messy life, and the prose reflects that.All in all, I finished this 400 page book in about a week and a half, I couldn't put it down. Highly highly recommended.

The title "The Last Great Road Bum" is the perfect title for this historical fiction book about Joe Sanderson's short, but impactful life. Hector Tobar used Joe Sanderson's notes and voice to help tell the story of his trips and adventures around the world. Sanderson couldn't stay in one place for very long as he searched for meaning and place he could make a difference. Family was extremely important to him, and as he traveled, he wrote long detailed and very coded letters to his parents and brother. He discovered later that he could use his life skills to help fight the unjust world in El Salvador. Joe was known by many there by his looks, but had many names to protect his identity while assisting and sometimes leading the abushes.The novel was sometimes a bit wordy, but also gave you a deep sense of what he was experiencing and witnessing throughout his many escapades. It was fascinating to witness the political awakening through Joe Sanderson's eyes during the 1960's through the 1980's.Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for allowing me to listen to this book for an honest review.

Tobar has recreated the real life of Joe Sanderson, who spend his short adult life bumming around the world. Using a trove of Sanderson’s journals, unpublished novels, and letters, Tobar has recreated the journeys and thoughts of a young guy from Urbana, Illinois who lusted for more. Joe’s thoughts flit from here to there, but always giving us a view of the new places he is exploring. He has a wide range of experiences from his early stay with Rastafarians in Jamaica to a wild road trip with Chileans in South America to experiencing the famine in Biafra. As he travels, the reader is privy to the reason he became a radical and eventually end up with guerrilla fighters in El Salvador. It was with this group that he died in combat at the age of 39. I was torn between wanting Joe to grow up and stop asking his mom for travel money and being jealous of his breezy way of traveling and meeting new people and spending more time listening than talking as he discovered new ways of looking at life.

Not your average Joe is the protagonist of Héctor Tobar’s novel titled, The Last Great Road Bum, While structured as a novel, this story of based on a real person, Joe Sanderson, who grew up in Urbana, Illinois and spent his life roaming the earth. Sanderson’s family entrusted Tobar with Joe’s letters and writings, and from that base, Tobar crafted an engaging story about a fascinating character who lived an extraordinary life.Rating: Four-star (I like it)

In “The Last Great Road Bum,” Hector Tobar takes literary license with actual events to color in the outlines of the life of a global wanderer. Through a lifetime of letters home and journal entries, we follow the protagonist to the far reaches of the globe. We meet colorful characters, experience far-off places, and observe some nasty and brutish world-shaking if futile conflicts. What makes “The Last Great Road Bum” especially interesting is that it is largely fact presented as fiction. at bookmanreader.blogspot.com . Read more

The book is a decent read but nothing great. It drags on towards the end after a promising start. Perhaps, it mirrors the protaganist Joe. A restless adventurous life but perhaps pointless depending on your view.