Whiteout: Lost in Aspen [Paperback]

Ted Conover (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 11, 2001

Irreverent, poignant, and revealing, this meditation on the sweet temptation of wealth and the vainglorious quest for paradise as they exist in Aspen, Colorado, features a "cast of characters (that) includes such barn-size satirical targets as exclusive health clubs, over-the-hill drug dealers and movie stars and rock stars of wattages bright and dim" (The New Republic).

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Conover's entertaining, unpretentious account of his two years in Aspen, Colo., lets the resort town's events and people speak for themselves.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Silver boomtown in the 1880s, bust a decade later due to the adoption of the gold standard, Aspen, Colorado, now is home to celebrities, Saab police cruisers, and a stagecoach taxi service whose equine employees are fitted with diapers. Working here for two years as cabbie, caterer, and newspaper reporter, Conover serves up an enticing melange appropriate both for stargazers hooked on the lifestyles of the rich and famous and pop sociologists. Rubbing shoulders with people as diverse as John Denver, Hunter S. Thompson, New Age cultists, and a 1980s miner, he offers intriguing commentary on modern Aspen's change from a planned utopia, combining skiing with high culture, to a sybaritic playground. A good addition to larger public library and regional collections.
- Jim Burns, Broward Cty. Lib. System, Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (September 11, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 067974178X
• ISBN-13: 978-0679741787
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.6 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #958,250 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Ted Conover is the author of several books including The Routes of Man and Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing (winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize). He also wrote Coyotes, Whiteout, and Rolling Nowhere: Riding the Rails with America's Hoboes. His writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, and National Geographic. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, he is Distinguished Writer-in-Residence in the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University. He lives in New York City.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Atypical and disappointing, October 16, 2001

By 

Ethan Zuckerman (Williamstown, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Whiteout: Lost in Aspen (Paperback)

Ted Conover has a distinctive modus operandus. He writes ethnographic studies of disadvantaged people by becoming part of the population as much as possible. He began, as a college student, becoming a hobo and riding the rails, as documented in "Rolling Nowhere". In his brilliant "Coyotes", he's amazingly successful at integrating himself into the illegal alien population, crossing secretly into the USA several times with Mexican migrant laborers. Most readers will know him from his recent "Newjack", where he becomes a prison guard and Sing-Sing to comment on the lives of guards and inmates.

"Whiteout" is the odd man out in Conover's oeuvre. We're on familiar territory initially - Conover is a cab driver in Aspen, spying on the lives of tourists while living the life of a working stiff. But he never fully commits, living with a wealthy friend in a palatial mansion, and later house-sitting for another millionaire. Later, he becomes a reporter for the local paper, and most of the book reads like extended versions of the newspaper stories he had opportunity to cover. We get a number of interesting pictures of life in Apsen, from ski bums to society madams, to an odd interlude in northern Florida with a former drug runner who _used_ to be based out of Aspen.

Perhaps the shotgun approach is meant to mirror the diversity and complexity of the interaction of social classes in Aspen. Or perhaps Conover saw an opportunity to turn a year off in Apsen into a book with a major publisher. Either way, the reader is left wishing that Conover would pick someone - anyone - to identify with, profile and feature. Instead, we get a mishmash that could only be appealing to readers interested in Apsen or the celebrities who live there. Skip this one and pick up any of his other books instead.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An ethnography of "paradise", October 1, 2001

By 

Thomas Selig (San Francisco, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Whiteout: Lost in Aspen (Paperback)

Ted Conover, who's known for his looks at the grittier side of life, tried something different in this book: a look at privilege and pleasure as they are enshrined in Aspen, CO. I think that writing about the rich is probably harder than it sounds--for one thing, the average reader doesn't have a lot of sympathy, and for another, most social analysis is directed at the less fortunate. But Conover looks, mostly seriously, at a place that is fairly silly, and the result is Insight of a very high grade.

The focus goes both tight and wide, the observations are sharp but not dismissive; we find ourselves in the company of starlets and busboys alike, and presented with quite a few moral dilemmas (is it RIGHT to live this way? how come everybody in the real world looks less attractive after Aspen?). Conover's candor alone makes Whiteout worth the price of admission. If your soul is lingering in Sing Sing after reading Newjack, this Rocky Mountain sojourn could be just the thing you need ...

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating Memoir of a Socially Stratified Colorado Town, June 12, 2005

By 

Renee Thorpe (Karangasem, Bali) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Whiteout: Lost In Aspen (Hardcover)

Conover is expert at gate-crashing and we are so lucky that he's a great writer, too. Here, he's written about his stint as a cab driver in Aspen, but the engrossing part is his own ability to crash celebrity-only functions.

It's an interesting study in the interaction of haves and have-nots, for the rich and pampered of this famed snow town NEED the hardworking waiters and drivers and maids and ski instructors and yet are often bizarrely detached from the realities of working a steady job. Conover finds ways of crossing into the world of the haves, without ever forgetting who he is.

Conover doesn't show real envy for the rich and famous, but he enjoyed their parties. He's a downhill skiier and cyclist, so he certainly enjoyed the outdoorsy life there and treats a venture into a star studded party as just another nature hike worth detailing. Conover shows a kind of pity, in fact, in a brilliant little section about hanging out in a bar booth with Mick Fleetwood and friends.

Who you'll meet in the vignettes and tales of Conover's observations of Aspen life: the plethora of fine-looking young ladies, the unreal mansions with their no-holds-barred parties, the spoiled nouveau riche corporate wives, movie stars and rock stars, the crotchety old guard of the small town, drunks and granola eaters, skiers and commuters from the working class lowland.

It's not a gossip-fest, nor is it a boring social critique. But it's a real slice of life. And you get a little local history and politics, too. It's a fine book for anyone who is fascinated by how the other half lives.

The author's own mobility, personable nature, and mutability are his true assets. He seemed to walk away from Aspen satisfied and with a desire to explore other realms. Which he does, again and again, in his brilliant books.

Good gift for a ski bum, for a social climber, for anyone who admires the art of schmoozing and faking it. Could be a bit too depressing for someone who lost in an attempt to get rich and join the upper crust.