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Letters From New Orleans |  | Author: Rob Walker
Publisher: Garrett County Press
Category: eBooks
This item is no longer available
Rating: 
Sales Rank: 109797
Format: Kindle Book
Media: Kindle Edition
ASIN: B001E37PZ0
Publication Date: June 1, 2005
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Amazon.com Review
When Rob Walker and his girlfriend relocated to New Orleans in 2000, Walker (a regular contributor to The New York Times Magazine) started filling his friends' email inboxes with tales of adventures from his new home. Those stories--capturing the simple, everyday, and often unbelievable moments that regularly transpired in the Crescent City--are the basis for the fascinating Letters from New Orleans. Here, the author describes the parades and jazz funerals not as a tourist would see them, but from behind the scenes, amidst the personalities. Over the course of 20 or so vignettes, Walker finds himself in dive bars that should probably be condemned; bicycling through an improvised community park that happens to exist directly below a busy freeway overpass; and mulling the consequences of random, celebratory gun firings that appear to be a regular occurrence in New Orleans. Throughout, Walker is the perfect fly on the wall; he's equal parts journalist, anthropologist, and tour guide. He devotes his energy equally to the beautiful, the downtrodden, and the wacky, but these are clearly love letters to the unique people of New Orleans. Walker is, quite simply, infatuated with his adopted city. With the 2005 flooding of Hurricane Katrina happening just months after the publishing of this book, these pieces serve as even more poignant snapshots; some of Walker's favorite landmarks may be gone forever. With that in mind, the author is devoting the proceeds from this wonderful effort to Katrina victims. --Jason Verlinde
Product Description
June Sawyers, The Chicago Tribune
"This is not a travel book per se, but rather an outsider's account of America's strangest town. Walker gives familiar places a new twist, a fresh perspective."
The New York Times Book Review, October 24, 2005
"...These stories now function as 21 silent little jazz funerals: exuberant, celebratory and tragic."
Library Journal
"...[Walker] has provided an informal, entertaining, and insightful guide to New Orleans for both the traveler and those considering relocating there."
Thomas Uskali, Mobile Register
"Rob Walker has captured so much truth about New Orleans, and so beautifully."
Michael Maiello, Forbes.com
"Letters from New Orleans tells the stories that you've never heard before and that you just can't hear while jaunting through the muggy city during Jazz Fest."
Andy Shoup, Maximum Rock'n'Roll
"The respect that Walker holds for his subjects coupled with his quirky and likeable tastes make Letters From New Orleans a fantastic read. It is more than just a good book. Its insider-outsider perspective and street-level historical explorations make it essential for anyone interested in New Orleans."
James Norton, Flak Magazine
"Letters From New Orleans ... is a love letter to Crescent City, and it stands within the most robust tradition of geography-centered writing....[I]t recalls writers such as V.S. Naipaul, who approach cities and countries with a hungry interest in demolishing false expectations."
Colleen Mondor, Voices of New Orleans
"Letters From New Orleans is a wonderful example of a unique talent."
From the Author
How will I market the book? As you have probably read somewhere, "traditional advertising" is dead. And speaking as the author of the Journal of Murketing, it is my opinion that none of the present alternatives satisfy: Stealth marketing is over, guerilla marketing is tired, underground marketing is played. So the time has come for a new approach: Phantom Marketing. Not only is Phantom Marketing secret, stealth, guerrilla and underground – it’s non-existent.
There is no street team. There is no snipe campaign. Key influencers are not even identified, let alone courted and "seeded" with product. The hottest DJs have not been hired, because exclusive parties will not be thrown. A secret, mobile pop-up store will not be moving from location to location in America’s hottest neighborhoods. Nothing will be distributed via "goody bag," and no one associated with Vice will be brought aboard to reveal what the cool people think. The folks who make a living posting fake messages on internet chat rooms will, for this project, post nothing. Hot graf artists will contribute no murals, no stickers, no stencils. There is no podcast, no blog, and no word of mouth ("organic" or otherwise). Everywhere you turn your eyes and ears – everywhere -- you’ll be totally surrounded by the absence of the brand.
Am I worried about others copying our unique Phantom Marketing tactics? No. Because executing a campaign like this one is incredibly expensive.
From the Back Cover
"This book is far more than a poetic testament to a strange and wonderful town. It's a story about a city boy who recognizes the need to slow down and observe carefully -- a story of a couple who learns to let our world's odd richness really sink in. I recommend it to anyone who feels life is going by too fast."
-- Po Bronson, author of What Should I Do With My Life?
"Rob Walker is a wonderful writer with a gentle yet comprehensive inquisitiveness, the rigorous, observant eye of a journalist, and the light, poetic touch of an artist."
--David Rakoff, author of Fraud
The Kindle Edition includes a bonus excerpt from Peter Hernon's A Terrible Thunder: The Story of the New Orleans Sniper
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