The Sprawl

Essay by Jason Diamond August 25, 2020 • 5.5 x 8.25 • 256 pages • 978-1-56689-582-8 From garage rock to Greta Gerwig, Jason Diamond asks us to reconsider the creative potential of the American suburb as he leads us down the cul-de-sac and out again. For decades the suburbs have been where art happens “despite”: despite the conformity, the emptiness, the sameness. The familiar story is one of gems formed under pressure, creative transcendence fueled by suburban resentment. But what if the suburb has actually been an incubator for distinctly American art, as positively and as surely as in any other cultural hothouse? Mixing personal experience, cultural reportage, and history while rejecting clichés and pieties, these essays stretch across the country in an effort to show that this uniquely American milieu deserves another look. About the Author Jason Diamond is a writer and editor living in Brooklyn. His first book was Searching for John Hughes. Praise for The Sprawl NPR, “Favorite Books of 2020” Booklist, “Best New Books 2020” Chicago Tribune, “10 Summer Books to Read” Esquire, “Best Summer Books of 2020” Town & Country, “Best Summer Books for 2020” The Week, “19 Books to Read in 2020” Electric Literature, “Best Nonfiction of 2020” Literary Hub, “Best New Books to Read This Summer” Planetizen, “Top Urban Planning Books of 2020” Refinery 29, “Best Summer Books 2020” “The American suburbs have taken on a mythical reputation: hyper-planned communities of uniformity, offering safety and security to some, suffocation to others. In this fascinating history, Diamond presents readers with a new way of viewing this ubiquitous environment. . . . A humble and curious must-read.” —Booklist, starred review “In this lively book of narrative nonfiction, Jason Diamond blends cultural criticism, reportage, and memoir to destigmatize America’s oft-derided suburbs. . . .  a warm, engaging reminder that places quickly written off can be the birthplace of the next big thing.” —Adrienne Westenfeld, Esquire “In this insightful work of narrative nonfiction, journalist Diamond (Searching for John Hughes) draws from personal experience, history, and media to consider the significance of the suburbs in American culture. . . . his cultural criticism is consistently astute. This is a smart, enjoyable study that will be particularly appreciated by other suburban expats.” —Publishers Weekly “[W]riter Jason Diamond examines how suburbia has shaped the country’s cultural landscape in profound ways. Using personal experience, history, and cultural reportage, Diamond finds these tidy, bland environs have produced or inspired some of the country’s finest artists, writers such as Dave Eggers and Jonathan Lethem and filmmakers John Hughes and Sofia Coppola.” —Amy Sutherland, Boston Globe “As the narrative progresses, the author becomes increasingly eloquent about such things as pop music. . . . literature as written by the likes of Dave Eggers and Jonathan Lethem, and film such as, yes, John Hughes’ oeuvre and Sofia Coppola’s interpretation of The Virgin Suicides. . . . A literate meditation on clipped-lawn places easily taken for granted but that well deserve such reflection.” —Kirkus “Diamond argues in a series of essays that the suburbs are essential to the development of American art and culture. He considers both the segregated nature of the suburbs themselves, grounding his study in the Chicagoland towns where he grew up, as well as the books, music and films they inspired.” —Jennifer Day, Chicago Tribune “The suburbs, with their strip malls and IHOPs and quiet nights, are for Diamond redolent both of nostalgia and terror. . . . The question is whether this new generation is going to recreate the suburban culture of America’s long-gone boom times, or aim for something else.” —Josephine Livingstone, The New Republic “[P]art melancholic meditation on the meaning of the suburbs, part encyclopedic survey of the suburbs in pop culture references, and part futurist reimagining of the possibilities of suburbia. At its core, it’s both a paean to the place that formed Diamond and a wistful epitaph to where that childhood was discarded.” —Isabel Slone, Hazlitt “[E]xcellent. . . . Diamond’s omnivorous and expansive sense allows him to weave history, popular culture, literature, film, and his own experiences into a revelatory take on suburban life.” —Nick Ripatrazone, The Millions “Bemoaning suburban life is practically an American pastime, but Jason Diamond posits instead that the suburbs have actually been a cradle for significant aspects of American culture, from garage rock to the literary tradition of Dave Eggers. Instead of looking at suburbs as bland swaths of cookie-cutter homes and shopping malls, Diamond finds value in the ordinary places where many Americans live.” —Town & Country “Jason Diamond explores the unexpected history that shaped many a suburb while also venturing into the notable art that arose from them. It’s the rare work of cultural criticism with a purview that encompasses William Gibson, Celeste Ng, and Anthony Bourdain—and it’s all the stronger for it.” —Tobias Carroll, Literary Hub “Offers an insightful examination of the type of places the majority of Americans call home. . . . Diamond is a keen cultural critic leveraging a deep reservoir of knowledge. The Sprawl leads us on a journey through the promise of suburbia while expertly peeling back the curtain.” —Ian MacAllen, Chicago Review of Books “In The Sprawl which manages the difficult feat of being exceptionally smart and wildly fun at the same time, Jason Diamond, a suburbanite by birth and city-dweller by choice, tracks the rise, fall, degradation, and rehabilitation of those city-ringing social laboratories that kids are begging to break out of and 40-somethings are flocking to. He’ll almost make you want to leave the city behind. Almost.” —Hilary Kelly, Vulture “Funny, smart, and heavy on pop culture allusions. . . . Where this book really excels is in identifying certain moods that relate to suburban America.” —Joseph Houlihan, Rain Taxi Review “Diamond’s book is a supremely researched taxonomy of the American suburb. . . . His cataloging of suburban cultural touchstones is a crucial first step towards having a healthy conversation about the suburbs today.” —Jason Katz, Ploughshares “By weaving a history of the suburbs with his own experiences and an in-depth look at their role in culture, Diamond shows that resentment of the suburbs is what makes them worth appreciating. He points out the once-bright and shining American Dream of owning a single-family home evolved into something else: sprawl.” —Madeline Bilis, Apartment Therapy “Despite the many stereotypes about the conformity of the suburbs, Chicago-area native Jason Diamond sees these borderland communities as the ‘incubator for distinctly American art’ . . . The Sprawl is precisely within Diamond's personal wheelhouse.” —Jeva Lange, The Week “[T]he suburbs are where author Jason Diamond (Searching for John Hughes) is from, and it's to the suburbs he returns in this smart, funny, probing look into a world of freshly mowed lawns, multi-car garages, and, yes, white picket fences. Incorporating suburban-focused cultural works, from John Cheever and Wes Craven, alike, Diamond explores all the different ways in which the suburban fantasy has cosseted some Americans, and discomfited—as well as excluded—so many others.” —Kristin Iversen, Refinery 29 “Piercing and melancholy. . . . Diamond looks back on his suburban upbringing with a profound mixture of pride and shame that you’ll surely recognize if you grew up there, too.” —Rob Harvilla, The Ringer “For Diamond, questions about the geography of American life—where and how we live—have proved to be fruitful material. . . . Diamond digs in and finds a more complicated reality.” —Kat Solomon, Chicago Review of Books “Diamond isn’t an apologist for the suburbs per se. He just refuses to condemn them, and he, unlike many critics of sprawl, makes the effort to discover what can be interesting, delightful, and enriching about them. . . . he wryly notes, ‘there isn’t a Jane Jacobs of the suburbs that I’m aware of.’ Well, Diamond might just be it.” —Josh Stephens and James Brasuell, Planetizen “[O]ne of several recent books to rethink what suburbia means. . . . linked by an intensive interest in what the suburbs have historically been, how they do and don’t adhere to the standard narratives we tell about suburbia and what they may become in the future.” —Andrew Schenker, MEL Magazine “[A] deliciously empathetic and clear-eyed treatise about The American Dream and the various ways its mythology has worked itself into our collective brains. It digs deep into how those lived ideals have often created disastrous consequences for our individual and collective psyches. . . . Jason Diamond has given us a genuine and heartfelt collection of essays equal parts personal reflection and public policy prognostication.” —Adam P. Newton, Bearded Gentlemen Music “For those of us who grew up outside of the suburbs, or encased by suburbs, there may have been a longing to understand their interior. The Sprawl is such a generous book for how it both acknowledges the privileges of boundary but also demystifies the small living moments that take place within. This is a warm and thoughtful book that doesn’t just coast on beauty and nostalgia without challenging both.” —Hanif Abdurraqib “Thoughtful, well-researched, and beautifully rendered, The Sprawl is a book that offers us insight into the suburban spaces that define America. Throughout each chapter, Diamond manages to be both generous and unsparing, funny and deeply thorough, in his analysis of the parking lots, privilege, and prejudice that infuse the America of our childhoods. The Sprawl is a necessary cultural analysis for understanding who we are as a nation and what we will become.” —Lyz Lenz “Jason Diamond instinctively understands how the American suburb has shaped the American psyche, somehow both softening and igniting it—he sees the depravity and ennui that Cheever immortalized, but also the odd beauty of mowed lawns and food courts and paved driveways. A child of the suburbs myself, I devoured this smart, probing, and deeply human meditation on what it means to be promised comfort, and what it feels like to tear yourself apart trying to escape it.” —Amanda Petrusich Praise for Searching for John Hughes “Tells a heartbreaking story of restless youth, imposter syndrome, and the movies that help him make sense of it all. . . . Makes me want to tell my parents and children how much I love them . . . and then curl up on the couch and watch The Breakfast Club.” —Emma Straub, author of the New York Times bestsellers Modern Lovers and The Vacationers “With geniality, humor and charm, Diamond explores the ways in which cinematic fantasy can influence, overshadow, and help us to escape reality. This book is for anyone playing out an eternal adolescence.” —Melissa Broder, author of So Sad Today “Jason Diamond writes with equal parts wit and candor about what happens when life diverges wildly from the suburban fairy tales made popular by John Hughes. Diamond passionately conveys how lovely it is when we find less cinematic but harder earned happy endings on our own terms.”—Maris Kreizman, author of Slaughterhouse 90210 “Oh look, it’s all my favorite things in one book: Chicago, New York City, punk rock, food, and existential crises . . . Bittersweet, charming and hilarious . . . details the longing and struggle of an aspiring writer with clarity, wit, and heart.” —Jami Attenberg, New York Times, best-selling author of The Middlesteins and Saint Mazie “Both funny and heartbreaking, Diamond’s memoir is not just an account of how one director’s films impacted-and perhaps saved-his life. It is also a memorable reflection on what it means to let go of the past and grow up. A quirkily intelligent memoir of finding oneself in movies.” —Kirkus