Route 17 is not just an iconic historical highway that runs the length of the eastern seaboard. It also passes through some of the most prime shrimping zones in the United States. Viewing this historical route through a contemporary lens, this study is an impressionistic profile of a vintage southern highway and the culture that surrounds it. Although the highway runs from Punta Gorda, on the Gulf Coast of Florida, to Winchester, Virginia, in the Shenandoah Mountains, this trip focuses on the section that skirts the Eastern Seaboard-known as The Coastal Highway, The Ocean Highway, or just 17-offering an anecdotal look at the colorful people and often quirky places that make up the essence of Lowcountry living.

This is not an academic study, although it does provide historical context to the areas involved, and it is not a technical book about the shrimp industry or the history of the highway. Both a travelogue and a foodie journal, the story told here provides a casual look into the culinary history of shrimp and an overview of the people who harvest, sell and consume them. In addition to visiting eateries along the route, both established and obscure, and visiting often remote ports-of-call cluttered with trawlers, Johnson also explores an archetype he identifies as a 17-er, a person who spends a lifetime on or near the highway, for whom the road defines and reflects a special type of character particular to living off 17.