JOHN WATERS reads from and discusses CARSICK: JOHN WATERS HITCHHIKES ACROSS AMERICA

Carsick: John Waters Hitchhikes Across America (Farrar Strauss Giroux)

Skylight Books is over the moon excited to welcome one of our favorite directors, writers and all-around cultural icons,John Waters for the launch of the paperback edition of Carsick: John Waters Hitchhikes Across America, his wild and wonderful memoir about what happened (and what might've happened) while hitchhiking across this great nation of ours.

NOTE: As with all Skylight Books events, this reading is free and open to the public (first come, first served).  But because we're expecting a large crowd at this event, we'll be giving out numbered tickets to the signing line to keep things organized.  To get a ticket to the signing line, you must purchase a paperback copy of Carsick: John Waters Hitchhikes Across America here at Skylight Books.  Tickets will be available starting May 12, 2015, the official release date for the paperback version of Carsick.  They will be available in-store, or you can order on our website and leave a note in the "Order Comments" field.  We will also hold a ticket for you if you order and pay for a book over the phone.  In addition to books, John Waters will sign memorabila and will pose for photographs with individual attendees. Thank you!

From acclaimed filmmaker and cult artist, John Waters, comes a cross-country hitchhiking journey with America's most beloved weirdo.

John Waters is putting his life on the line. Armed with wit, a pencil-thin mustache, and a cardboard sign that reads "I'm Not Psycho," he hitchhikes across America from Baltimore to San Francisco, braving lonely roads and treacherous drivers. But who should we be more worried about, the delicate film director with genteel manners or the unsuspecting travelers transporting the Pope of Trash? 

Before he leaves for this bizarre adventure, Waters fantasizes about the best and worst possible scenarios: a friendly drug dealer hands over piles of cash to finance films with no questions asked, a demolition-derby driver makes a filthy sexual request in the middle of a race, a gun-toting drunk terrorizes and holds him hostage, and a Kansas vice squad entraps and throws him in jail. So what really happens when this cult legend sticks out his thumb and faces the open road? His real-life rides include a gentle eighty-one-year-old farmer who is convinced Waters is a hobo, an indie band on tour, and the perverse filmmaker's unexpected hero: a young, sandy-haired Republican in a Corvette. 

Laced with subversive humor and warm intelligence, Carsick is an unforgettable vacation with a wickedly funny companion--and a celebration of America's weird, astonishing, and generous citizenry.

Praise for Carsick:

“Waters idiosyncratically cuts to the core of American diversity, finding the good (and bad) in any situation with biting wit…Waters devotees take note: this is required reading.” –Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Waters has made a funny engaging and—of course—occasionally outrageous book . . . All in all a cool trip and a delightful book." - Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post

“Fantastical and plush . . . Carsick becomes a portrait not just of America’s desolate freeway nodes — though they’re brilliantly evoked — but of American fame itself.”  – NY Times Book Review
 
“Travel—uh, hitchhiking—book of the year?" —Ray Olson, Booklist
 
"A flavorful book, with the same cheeky sentimentality we experienced in Water's memoir Role Models plus a Divine-sized dose of kitsch. John Waters fans like me will be ecstatic." —Annie Coreno, Publishers Weekly

“Waters gives full rein to his trash roots with fictional creations that rival anything he’s ever put on screen…Waters, in short, discovers Middle America, somewhere safely between his imaginary world of trash and the glitz of high culture.” –Norman Powers, New York Journal of Books
 
“A good helping of unbridled lewdness is surely to be expected, and no doubt cherished, from the man known as the king of filth and the pope of trash.”—Geoff Nicholson, San Francisco Chronicle
 
“Waters doesn’t bore us with theories as to why the open road has become so much less open; he allows his nasty nostalgic fantasies to hint at the abandon so absent from our lives.”— Michael Andor Brodeur
 
“Waters offers readers an outlandish glimpse into his mind in vintage Waters fashion…the book is also an homage to a lost American pastime of getting into cars with strangers.”—Justin Snow, Metro Weekly
 
“The book, a kind of ode to America, fits with Mr. Waters’s belief that New York is no longer the creative center of the universe” M.H. Miller, New York Observer
 
“The novellas read like short stories that could be made into films… Funny and shocking…yet fans of the filmmaker’s work will likely be more amused than shocked.”—Gary M. Kramer, Frontiers

John Waters is an American filmmaker, actor, writer, and visual artist best known for his cult films, including Hairspray, Pink Flamingos, and Cecil B. DeMented. He is also the author of a memoir, Role Models. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland.