One recent book trend links such disparate activities as sex and dishwashing, playing the French horn and cooking French food—quest books. A.J. Jacobs, the author of four such books (The Know-It All, The Year of Living Biblically, My Life as an Experiment, and Drop Dead Healthy), is a leader in this subgenre. Reminiscent of gonzo and immersion journalism or lumped on the shelves with memoir, quest books are chronicles of personal pursuits distinctive in several ways.
Unlike typical memoirs, quest books aren’t inspired by challenges or experiences that would at first seem particularly thrilling or unique. This niche wouldn’t include Bill Irwin’s narrative of his daring hike on the Appalachian Trail or even Bill Bryson’s more tame trek. Quests books depict the Average Joe or Josie embarking on low-risk—and often curious—missions such as visiting all the Laura Ingalls Wilder locales, washing dishes in every state, learning a musical instrument, knitting, cooking, or coitus. They take a “let’s see what will happen to me if” rather a “look what happened to me way back when” approach to memoir.
Quest books are also more deliberate. Rather than recounting naturally occurring or unforeseen events, the challenges are designed and invited, often including timeframes or other planned parameters. While immersion journalists like Barbara Ehrenreich in Nickel & Dimed or John Howard Griffin in Black Like Me attempt to enter into or replicate known circumstances with reporting an inside perspective as their main goal, quest book narrators are already immersed from the start. Their pre-existing lives are the focus of actions and tests which may or may not produce any significant effect at all but begin with a specific outcome in mind.
While many of these books invoke the idea of a quest in their title, the term seems inflated compared to the quests of classical literature—Odysseus’s ten-year journey home, the Argonaut’s retrieval of the Golden Fleece—or even when compared to modern fiction quests like Frodo’s pursuit of the One Ring. These books embody a unified definition of the term quest that varies from previous definitions within literary criticism. Such redefinition supports the viability of quest books existence as their own subgenre.
The draw of quest books is uncertain, but their proliferation indicates the appeal is genuine. Many deliver more depth and insight than their premises might suggest. Rather than merely chronicling a Brittanica reader’s progress, for example, The Know-It All is a worthwhile discussion of modern perceptions of intelligence, peppered with fascinating facts. In an era of disgraced role models, whether its athletes, politicians, or priests, have we turned our trust to average schmoes to inspire us? Or is the mundaneness of the quest the very thing that appeals—that is, its attainability? How many readers identify with Jacobs in feeling that though they may never be able to climb Mount Everest, they could read a really big book? One bleak explanation for this trend could be an increasing dissatisfaction with our present human existence, dissatisfaction that prompts a growing search for purpose, happiness, and meaning. No matter what the impetus behind the quest books trend, a closer look at what it is we profess to be questing for offers interesting insights into our culture. To that end, the following are books that fall into this new category.
The Know-It All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World–A.J. Jacobs–2004
Dishwasher: One Man’s Quest to Wash Dishes in All Fifty States–Pete Jordan–2007
365 Nights: A Memoir of Intimacy–Charla Muller with Betsy Thorpe –2008
Reading the OED: One Man, One Year, 21,730 Pages–Ammon Shea–2008
Julie and Julia–Julie Powell–2009
The Geography of Bliss: One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places in the World–Eric Weiner–2009
Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously–Adrienne Martini –2010
The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner’s Semester at America’s Holiest University–Kevin Roose–2010
The One-Week Job Project: One Man, One Year, 52 Jobs–Sean Aiken–2010
The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie–Wendy McClure–2011
My Year with Eleanor–Noelle Hancock–2011
Tolstoy and the Purple Chair: My Year of Magical Reading–Nina Sankovitch–2011
Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything–Joshua Foer–2011
My Dirty Little Secret: One Man’s Year-Long Quest Not to Masturbate–John Hardman–2011
Drop Dead Healthy: One Man’s Humble Quest for Bodily Perfection–A.J. Jacobs–2012
Trudie Gauerke 