An American Map

Meditative travel essays by Michigan author Anne-Marie Oomen that explore new landscapes across America.


In An American Map, Anne-Marie Oomen, award-winning writer and self-confessed northern Michigan homebody, chronicles her recent travels across America, in essays that span rediscovered landscapes, wild back roads, vital cities, and everything in between. Oomen takes both a wide and narrow lens to her destinations, giving readers a vivid sense of each locale while finding resonances between each place and her own experiences. With each new adventure, Oomen finds her sense of self deepening and becoming more clearly rooted in the larger adventure of America.

The evocative essays of An American Map consider locations across the United States, from the poetry of Alpine meadows to the terror of desert border crossings, the irony of ocean floors littered with live ordnance, and the excitement of a rural film premiering in New York City. Oomen’s warm, personal voice takes readers into the heart of each experience, as she imagines that a place like the Smoky Mountains could offer insight into the Iraq War or that a decaying war tank could help save rare turtles. Oomen proves that the value of travel is not merely in the physical place but the spiritual or meditative place it allows us to visit at the same time.

Fans of Oomen’s writing, as well as all readers interested in travel writing, will appreciate the unique insights and diverse landscapes of An American Map.