I strongly encourage anyone who wants a taste of what nuclear war would look like to watch Threads[1].
Despite being the most terrifying depiction of nuclear war that I've ever seen, and it is probably overoptimistic.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, a general in charge of UK's nuclear strategic defense met with his Soviet counterpart and asked the latter what he thought of Threads and the latter laughed and said the entire UK was an overkill zone.
In the US you are either by major population areas (as most people are) and will probably be targeted by many weapons in the megaton range, and if you're in remote areas you're probably near some missile bases and will be wiped out too. Nuclear winter and fallout will get the rest.