Fear and Trembling in Las Vegas functions as the perfect sequel to Will Hoyt’s The Seven Ranges. In The Seven Ranges, Hoyt sought answers to how and why small, self-sufficient landholders in eastern Ohio consented to the destruction of once-thriving townships and even topography itself via strip mining in the 1960s. Surprisingly, America itself and its grandeur as a project came into view after following strictly localized clues. Now, in Fear and Trembling, Hoyt details a different kind of devastation—the collapse of Western Civilization as experienced by residents in eastern Ohio, Cleveland, and Michigan between 1994 and 2024. In this case, he employs popular culture as a lens rather than land. Yet, despite these differences, America and its grandeur as a project once again come into view. Readers will close this new book with a firm grasp not only on the importance of the American dream, but also on the timeliness of its promise.

Praise for Fear and Trembling in Las Vegas

“Astonishing. Hard to classify. Carpenter-poet Will Hoyt puts a new spin on ‘gonzo journalism,’ transforming it by both deepening its roots—going all the way back to John Muir, nodding to Woody Guthrie along the way—and assuming it into an Augustinian heart. By the time Hoyt arrives in the final chapter at Las Vegas, the place where ‘America is on display,’ he is ready to see it and judge it in the light of man’s eschatological destiny. Hoyt demonstrates here what a mind might look like that is at one and the same time genuinely American and genuinely Catholic.”

—D. C. Schindler, Professor of Metaphysics and Anthropology, John Paul II Institute

“Mr. Hoyt’s first book, The Seven Ranges, knocked me clean off my feet—on my fifth read, just as sure as it did on the first. Fear and Trembling in Las Vegas picks me up, dusts off my back side, and points out the path of my pilgrimage through postmodern America—which is, whether I want it to be or not—the land of my sojourn. The first book burns the eyes clean. The second calls the heart forward. Simply beautiful work.”

—David Michael Phelps, President, Harmel Academy of the Trades

“Will Hoyt, the Berkeley carpenter now working as an Appalachian boniface, calls this book ‘a time-lapse photograph of civilizational collapse,’ but his photograph dazzles with rays of light, fulgent gifts. Whether writing about John Muir, Elmore Leonard, Cormac McCarthy, Bob Dylan, or the spectacularly fertile decade of Thoreau, Hawthorne, and Melville, Fear and Trembling in Las Vegas brims with fresh and unexpected insights on every page. Hell, now I even want to visit Las Vegas—because the smart money is on Will Hoyt.”

—Bill Kauffman, author of Dispatches from the Muckdog Gazette