‘The Partly Cloudy Patriot’ by Sarah Vowell

Author: Sarah Vowell

In this insightful and funny collection of personal stories, Vowell travels through the American past and in doing so ponders a number of curious questions: Why is she happiest when visiting the sites of bloody struggles like Salem or Gettysburg? Why do people always inappropriately compare themselves to Rosa Parks? Why is a bad life in sunny California so much worse than a bad life anywhere else? What is it about the Zen of foul shots? And, in the title piece, why must doubt, and internal arguments haunt the sleepless nights of the true patriot?