One Hit Wonderland

Starred review from February 1, 2009
The author of A Piano in the Pyrenees (2008), Playing the Moldovans at Tennis (2001), and Round Ireland with a Fridge (2000) is, to be sure, a unique and engaging writer of travel memoirs. But did you know he also recorded two hit records? All right, the first was in 1988 (it was called Stutter Rap, a spoof of the Beastie Boys), and the second was a hit only in Albania; but the point is he has two hits to his name. This very funny memoir is the story of how he scored his second hit, and it takes him from Nashville to Africa to, obviously, Albania. Along the way, as he tries to find just the right song to put him back on the charts, he tries everything from spoofy countryand western to a Paul Simoninspired blending of African and traditional rock themes to, well, just about anything he thinks might work. Its the best kind of travel memoir: alternately informative and hilarious, with a cast of memorable characters who, if they werent real people, would be right at home in a zany comic novel. Hawks is a lively, inquisitive storyteller, and readers, as always, will come away from the book glad to have accompanied him on another offbeat odyssey.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)