Sour Cherries at Buc-ee's

<p>What do sour cherries a subway reprimand in Moscow and an imaginary alligator named Fluffy have in common? In <em>Sour Cherries at Buc-ee's</em> Mark Elberfeld invites readers on a deeply personal-and often unexpectedly funny-journey through memory movement and meaning.</p><p></p><p>From a seventh-grade retreat on the Mattaponi River to the surreal vastness of a Buc-ee's gas station Elberfeld traces the threads of identity place and connection. Whether he's reflecting on summer camp road trips in an electric car the quiet radicalism of hospitality or a friend's hauntingly beautiful art show his essays linger in that liminal space between the ordinary and the profound.</p><p></p><p>With humor honesty and a teacher's instinct for drawing meaning from mess Elberfeld explores what it means to leave to return to remember and to reframe. For anyone who's ever found themselves crying in a parking lot questioning the shape of freedom or chasing summer like a white whale-this book might just be the life ring you didn't know you needed.</p><p></p><p>In Mark Elberfeld's Sour Cherries we meet something to relish: an unrelenting mind on the page. Here we travel to summer camp to Switzerland to Vermont and that dreaded region: chemistry class. Humorous and meditative <em>Sour Cherries</em> ponders that age-old quandary: Why must we travel away to really understand who we are at home in ourselves? Building in tension with wide-ranging material from Frankenstein and Walt Whitman to Shawna Miller and getting a rental car Sour Cherries is a delight that explores all the complexities of human emotion.</p><p></p><p>--Taylor Brorby author of<em> Boys and Oil: Growing Up Gay in a Fractured Land</em></p><p></p><p>[C]aught as we all are in this politically divisive moment as distrust and cynicism hold sway Elberfeld's sensibilities could not be more timely or necessary. The writer's curiosity and good-will whether among friends or strangers offer the rare alternative of civility across difference.</p><p></p><p>--Laurie Clark</p>