Methland

We read Methland: The Death and Life of an American Small Town, by Nick Reding, for book club. The book is quite interesting and I encourage you to read it if you are at all interested in Midwestern drug culture, or even Midwestern culture. Reding creates an argument for the proliferation of meth in the Midwest based on a number of factors - the abundance of chemicals (for corn production), people with few options for employment or wealth, and even that good-old-fashioned American work ethic.

To read his book, you'd think there wasn't a town in the Midwest that wasn't completely destroyed by meth. For me, one of the fallacies of his argument is that I'm from a small Midwestern town and, at least for now, it isn't running rampant with meth addicts roaming the streets like zombies. Of course, that's just my experience, I do know that some of my friends from the Midwest DO know people who's lives have been destroyed by the drug.

I think the book would have made a really terrific long article, perfect for Vanity Fair or the New Yorker, but I thought it was a bit long for a book. I GET IT! METH'S REALLY BAD AND STUFF.