The Distance from Slaughter County: Lessons from Flyover Country

by Steven Moore

As a soldier and civilian, Steven Moore has traveled from the American Midwest to Afghanistan and beyond. In those travels, he's seen what place can mean, specifically rural places, and how it follows us, changes us. What Moore has to say about rural places speaks to anyone who has driven a lonely road at night, with nothing but darkness as a cushion between them and the emptiness that surrounds. Place and how we define it—and how it defines us—is a through line throughout the collection of eleven essays. Moore writes about where we come from and the disconnection we often feel between each between veterans and nonveterans, between people of different political beliefs, between regions, between eras. These pieces build into a contemplative whole, one that is a powerful meditation on why where we come from means something and how we'll always bring where we are with us, no matter where we go.

Genres: Essays

160 pages, Paperback

Published March 7, 2023

About the author

Steven Moore holds a BA in English from the University of Iowa and an MFA in creative nonfiction from Oregon State University. His debut book The Longer We Were There: A Memoir of a Part-Time Soldier (University of Georgia Press, 2019) received the AWP Award for Creative Nonfiction. His essay collection The Distance from Slaughter County: Lessons from Flyover Country is forthcoming in March 2023 from the University of North Carolina Press.

His nonfiction has appeared in Mud Season Review, Iron Horse Literary Review, The Normal School, and the anthology Why We Write: Craft Essays on Writing War (Middle West Press); and was named as notable in Best American Essays 2021. He currently resides in Portland, Oregon.

Reviews

[kc · Rating 5 out of 5]

the ida tarbell essay..!