Silent Retreat is a two-book collection documenting five weeks spent alone on the road across the United States. André Rober Beriau left Worcester, MA intending to spend his summer in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Making stops in Colorado, the Four-Corners Region, and throughout the Southwest, he had planned to spend July working on a memoir about his two years spent living in Sierra Leone, West Africa. When things didn’t go as expected, he rolled out of the Land of Enchantment and let fate take over. His travels led him past the Mississippi, to Red Rocks twice, over the Rockies, up to Mesa Verde National Park, inside an awkward poetry night, and accidentally to the West Coast. While it wasn’t the trip he intended on taking, it was entirely the kind of life-affirming experience he needed. Between the hours spent behind the steering wheel, sleeping at truck stops, stage diving into oblivion, and soaking up the freedom that is the Great American Road Trip, André captured his experiences on a Sony voice recorder and a 35mm film camera. He has compiled his photographs, receipts, maps, and various ephemera of America’s highways and backroads into this 130-page scrapbook, documenting what his day-to-day experience felt and looked like.
 
This visual retelling of his road trip is accompanied by a 144-page collection of journals and reflections that documents his time on the road. They reveal his mental state, the challenges he left at home, and his musings on the world beyond his windshield. André’s writing brings authenticity and vulnerability to these revised and edited journals - balancing humor and gratitude for his good fortune with an East Coast bite of reality.  
 
*This is a Pre-Order. Expect Orders to Arrive between 12/25 and 1/9/26*
 
*Scrapbook orders include a copy of : Silent Retreat: Journals & Reflections*
 
*YOUR ORDER WILL INCLUDE TWO BOOKS FOR $35*