Edward Abbey, YA author

Flux author and new-to-Blogger blogger Brian Mandabach inaugurated his blog's new home by invoking Edward Abbey, thus continuing the weird psychic connection he and I seem to have (when I first read Brian's book I was listening to music, and it was like he was predicting the next song on my iPod with his many musical references).

When I was a YA, I devoured Edward Abbey, particularly his novels (The Monkey Wrench Gang was my favorite) and his book of disconnected thoughts, Voice Crying in the Wilderness. Abbey wrote about adults, but his adults always seemed be trying to escape the adult world for a more visceral existence in a way that resonated for 14-year-old me (to "light out for the territory" as Brian Mandabach would probably say, borrowing from Hemingway Twain). I spent hours reading and rereading George Washington Heyduke's escape into the Maze, the impenetrable canyon desert of Utah that Abbey conjured so well. It really appealed to me.

Anyway, check out Brian's blog here and his old one on MySpace.