When I read George Saunders' Pastoralia three or four years back, I discovered I wasn't the fan everyone else was. Maybe I need to check out the new book though -- everything of his I remember seeing the last few years (the New Yorker pieces, the Esquire story) have been golden. The pinnacle* though is this bit from a Powell's interview/questionnaire Saunders completed:

Ships, planes, trains, or automobiles? No, I am a Luddite, and also a radical Catholic, so only travel by crawling on my belly while mumbling an incantation of the many ways I am unworthy. Time-consuming, sure, but worth it.

*The "pinnacle"? How could I really know?