One-storied America (Russian: Одноэтажная Америка) is a 1937 book based on a published travelogue across the United States by two Soviet authors, Ilf and Petrov.

The book, divided into eleven chapters and in the uninhibited humorous style typical of Ilf and Petrov, paints a multi-faceted picture of the US.

The majority of the American population lives in small towns of three thousand, maybe five, nine, or fifteen thousand inhabitants.The United States, which was perceived as the land of machines and technological progress, was of great importance at the time for the Soviet Union, which had set itself the goal of overtaking the United States.

During the writers' stay in America, Pravda also published their essay "American Encounters" (January 5, 1936), which in the book concludes the 25th chapter, "The Desert".

They returned to Moscow in early February 1936 and announced in an interview with a correspondent for Literaturnaya Gazeta that they would write a book about America.

The text was accompanied by about 150 American photographs by Ilf, which captured the appearance of the country and portraits of people with whom the writers met in America.

[1] Four people (both authors and the Adams married couple from New York) bought a brand new Ford with a "noble mouse color" and crossed America from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean and back in two months (late 1935-early 1936).

From "One-Story America" the Soviet reader first learned about publicity, life on credit and the ideology of consumption (In the chapter "Mr. Ripley's Electric House").

[2] One-Story America has been repeatedly published in Bulgarian, English, Spanish, Czech, Serbian, Romanian, French, Italian and other languages.

Ilf and Petrov's travelogue was criticized in the Soviet Union because it was not party enough and praised many aspects of American life.

"One-Story America" was a hit with American readers and received a lot of praise in the press, including:[3][10] Channel One Russia created a 16-part mini-series in 2008.

Two journalists, Vladimir Posner, who grew up in the US, and the younger Ivan Urgant followed the route described in the book (with a few variations, e.g. a trip to Las Vegas) and conducted interviews with locals.