"It wasn't clear in 1870 what sort of sequel Twain might devise after the triumph of The Innocents Abroad, but all indications suggest that he would continue to excel as a writer of humorous travelogue.

Instead, he surprised readers and himself by taking an enormous step in the direction of literary fiction, creating a book that continues to dazzle with the variety of its many idioms and the sheer exuberance of its depiction of frontier life," Henry Wonham tells us in his afterword.

Marking a crucial phase in the author's life and career, Roughing It vividly recounts Twain's adventures in the West.

Twain blends autobiography and tall tale to produce this engaging humorous account of six boisterous years in Nevada, San Francisco, and Hawaii.

Genteel culture meets frontier culture head-on in this wildly inventive, high-spirited book, and neither will ever be the same.