Popular travel writer Tom Miller brings his keen, original, and humorous eye to bear on the area he's lived in for 30 years - the American Southwest and adjoining northern Mexico. Jack Ruby's Kitchen Sink: Travels Through America's Southwest is a first person guided tour of the American Southwest and adjoining northern Mexico. It reflects on the remarkable Southwestern and Mexican land and the extraordinary and unusual people who criss-cross its bleached deserts, cracked pavements, and 18-hole golf courses. The book's posture is optimistic and enthusiastic, contemplative and vigilant. Miller's tone stays amiable, immediate, and descriptive throughout, growing angry now and then and getting involved when necessary. The reader will hear unfamiliar accents and inviting music (including the history of "La Bamba" and see landscapes both real and metaphoric with mesquite trees to pause beneath and back alleys to wander down. The book's ultimate message is that the tension between the land and the people who walk upon it benefits the latter to the detriment of the former.