"A middle-aged man, Jeremy Chester, having won a car in a raffle, decides to take to the road and head west, his intention being to "talk to people, not to pass them to dialogue." His journey becomes an odyssey as, along the way, he picks up nine passengers of varied types and backgrounds an Italian, a hippie, a black militant, a policeman--and finds the essential humanness in each. Ecology, the military, racism, old age, protest: all are explored and illuminated as we come to understand that the incongruities and anachronisms of contemporary life are more than merely annoying or depressing--they are lethal. Yet the journey goes on, heading for Big Sur and the redeeming state of naturalness which may already have escaped us forever."--