by Bill Geist
First published 2019
Bill Geist looks back on the summers that changed his life. During the 1960s, he worked at Arrowhead Lodge, a small resort run by his larger-than-life uncle at Lake of the Ozarks. Geist took on every job the place offered, from cleaning cesspools to carrying bags as a bellhop. The lake drew middle-class families from the Midwest before tourism became an industry. They came for man-made beaches, Hillbilly Mini Golf, and souvenir shops selling feathered rubber tomahawks. Geist encountered a parade of quirky locals and summer visitors who left their mark on his developing sense of humor and worldview. The Emmy Award-winning CBS correspondent traces how these formative experiences shaped his later career hunting down colorful characters for major news outlets. His memoir captures a vanished America when the Ozarks served as a middle-class paradise, complete with all its eccentric charm and small-town peculiarities.
Genres: 20th-century, autobiography, biography-memoir, americana
Vibes: emotional-atmospheric, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, found-family
Setting: Lake of the Ozarks
Period: 1960s
208 pages · Hardcover · Grand Central Publishing