Excerpt from Adult Braces by Lindy West, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

How long would it take to drive to the Florida Keys and back? Two weeks? I mapped it. At least a month. I can't be gone for a whole month. What about all the stuff I take care of? Who will turn the thermostat down at night and make sure all the lights are turned off except for the one light that I leave on so burglars know someone is home?

But also, I thought... I don't have a real job. I don't have little kids. I have a tiny bit of money left (ha ha, not enough!) from my last book and the third season of Shrill. In truth, the only thing stopping me was that long ago I'd convinced myself I had no interest in adventure because I was an agoraphobic wreck from being a fat woman in public. At some point, I'd decided that I was an indoor person, a vicarious person, that my exploration was over, that the door was shut and only home was safe.

Usually, safe means alive. But sometimes safe can mean dead. Dead as in still. Dead as in dark. Dead as in no longer growing.

It had occurred to me lately that perhaps I was dead. Was I dead?

I brought the idea to my husband, Ahamefule. A month... on the road... solo ... Kokomo and back. I was sure he'd say he was too busy. The dog needed too many walks. Aham had his own life—he wasn't just an accessory to mine. But to my surprise, he took me by the hands.

"In ten years together, you've never once expressed any interest in doing anything by yourself," he said. "I've been waiting for you to ask me something like this. You're actually not allowed to not go."

Holy shit, I thought. It's happening. Hose off that double-wide hammock, Jimmy Buffett! Mama's comin'!

Giddy, I sat down to make my itinerary. The song says, "Off the Florida Keys / there's a place called Kokomo," which seemed like a good place to start, so I googled "Kokomo Florida Keys." I got a bunch of links to the lyrics of the song "Kokomo." Hmm. Suspicious. I googled, "Where is Kokomo from the Beach Boys song located?"

Google: "Although the song depicts Kokomo as a place off the Florida Keys, there really is no Kokomo in South Florida."

W
H
A
T
??????????
J'EXQUEEZE MOI?

Kokomo isn't a real place????? Kokomo isn't a real place. Of course it's not. Why would it be? Of course the big destination of my symbolic road trip, the capital of not having to deal with shit for one precious fucking moment, is fictional. Was happiness fictional too? Sometimes, lately, it felt like it.

But I wasn't going to let Mike Love, the worst Beach Boy, ruin this midlife crisis for me. Driving to the Florida Keys would be just as good as driving to Kokomo, I reckoned—better, even, since they exist. I wasn't too sure what the Florida Keys were, but soon learned that they are a coral and mangrove archipelago stretching toward Cuba from the southern tip of Florida, connected by something called the Overseas Highway, a series of reality-straining bridges hovering for miles over the open ocean, seemingly devised by dastardly murder-inventor Jigsaw from Saw. Sounded perfect for my purposes! I was hankering to get a little dastardly myself.

There was just one last thing to figure out. I couldn't leave Aham without a car for a month, and I couldn't afford to pay for a month of hotel rooms on top of a rental car and gas. Plus, some deep, unknowable instinct told me that to really get this growing done, I needed dirt, grime, sweat, exposure, back pain, bug bites, and the kind of scouring discomfort that only living outside can provide. Seeking comfort above all else was what had gotten me into this meltdown. If I had to rent a car anyway, let it be a van.

I would drive to Key West in a van, and I would sleep in the van, and I would be afraid, but I would do it anyway. I would be uncomfortable, and I would heal.

Excerpted from Adult Braces by Lindy West. Copyright © 2026 by Lindy West. Excerpted by permission of Grand Central Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.