<div><div><DIV>           In 1978, William Least Heat-Moon made a 14,000-mile journey on the back roads of America, visiting 38 states along the way. In 1982, the popular <i>Blue Highways</i>, which chronicled his adventures, was published. Three decades later, Edgar Ailor III and his son, Edgar IV, retraced and photographed Heat-Moon's route, culminating in Blue Highways<i> Revisited</i>, released for publication on the thirtieth anniversary of <i>Blue Highways</i>. A foreword by Heat-Moon notes, “The photographs, often with amazing accuracy, capture my verbal images and the spirit of the book. Taking the journey again through these pictures, I have been intrigued and even somewhat reassured that America is changing not quite so fast as we often believe. The photographs, happily, reveal a recognizable continuity – but for how much longer who can say – and I'm glad the Ailors have recorded so many places and people from <i>Blue Highways</i> while they are yet with us.</div><p> </p><div>            Through illustrative photography and text, Ailor and his son capture once more the local color and beauty of the back roads, cafes, taverns, and people of Heat-Moon's original trek. Almost every photograph in Blue Highways <i>Revisited</i> is referenced to a page in the original work. With side-by-side photographic comparisons of eleven of Heat-Moon's characters, this new volume reflects upon and develops the memoir of Heat-Moon's cross-country study of American culture and spirit. Photographs of Heat-Moon's logbook entries, original manuscript pages, Olympia typewriter, Ford van, and other artifacts also give readers insight into Heat-Moon's approach to his trip. Discussions with Heat-Moon about these archival images provide the reader insight into the travels and the writing of <i>Blue Highways</i> that only the perspective of the author could provide.</div><p> </p><div>            Blue Highways<i> Revisited</i> reaffirms that the "blue highway" serves as a romantic symbol of the free and restless American spirit, as the Ailors lose themselves to the open road as Heat-Moon did thirty years previously. This book reminds readers of the insatiable attraction of the “blue highway”—“But in those brevities just before dawn and a little after dusk—times neither day or night—the old roads return to the sky some of its color. Then, in truth, they carry a mysterious cast of blue, and it's that time when the pull of the blue highway is strongest, when the open road is a beckoning, a strangeness, a place where a man can lose himself” (Introduction to <i>Blue Highways</i>).</div></div></div>