Camping with the Communists: The Adventures of an American Family in the Soviet Union

A memoir about an average family camping trip could have, shall we say, limited appeal. This work, however, is about an American family traveling in the Soviet Union in 1977. Gilden was studying Russian language and history, and longed to see the places she read about. She essentially talked her family into going on a trip through Europe, planning to visit exotic places when information about the USSR in particular was difficult to obtain. She recounts frustrating dealings with Soviet bureaucracy, unglamorous conditions in campgrounds, and nervousness about being arrested for minor infractions, but she also gives a sense of her gratitude for a life-changing adventure and the interesting people she met along the way. The trip was a dream come true, and this work is a testament to how the author and her family made it happen.