In this compendium Lee Friedlander examines the ordinary pickup truck, a quintessentially American mode of transportation. Unadorned in form as well as function, pickups have long been the vehicle of choice for farmers and tradespeople. Their well-worn beds-usually open to the elements, laid bare for all to see-have held and hauled all manner of things, from spare tires and jumbles of wires to animals and the occasional person. Friedlander, in his witty and encompassing clear-eyed idiom, has observed this most utilitarian and unapologetically personal object in its native setting: the cacophonous bricolage that is the American social landscape.

Living for an hour or more inside his superb way of seeing is like taking a walk down a busy city street on a bright day: your ordinary vision is transformed into something sharper, more uncanny, more intelligent and more generous. -Teju Cole, the New York Times Magazine