The Lost Continent constitutes Bill Bryson’s first foray into the travel book genre – a genre which he would eventually become exceptionally familiar with.
The Lost Continent tells the story of Bryson’s two trips (one in 1987, the next in the spring of 1988) from his birthplace of Des Moines, Iowa to places all around the United States – from New England to the Midwest to California and the Rocky Mountains. Bryson divided his book (and his trip) into “East” and “West,” after the parts of the country he visited.
In total, Bryson’s trips lasted a staggering 13,978, during which time Bryson reminisced about his life and the people who inhabited it – particularly his father, who had died just prior to the start of Bryson’s first trip. Each page of the book is filled more with some of Bryson’s trademark humor and anecdotes about his long trips. It does not, however, cover what many travel books do: the history of the places that Bryson visited.
Throughout both of his trips, Bryson made a point not to go to tourist destinations so that he could fully and honestly experience parts of the country that would’ve been otherwise misrepresented by the tourist destinations.
