Travel Writing Memoirs

Simon Nye's TV series, The Durrells, is based loosely on Gerald Durrell's Corfu Trilogy and in particular his much-loved best seller, My Family and Other Animals. These books in turn are based somewhat loosely on actual events. The real-life Durrells went to Corfu at the urging of Lawrence Durrell, who was already living on the island with his wife, Nancy Myers. Their intent was to keep the family together as his mother, Louisa, was drinking heavily and recovering from a breakdown.

Not so long ago, two carefree 18-year-olds hitchhiked across a country of wide-open highways and wide-open people. Ride with them on this nostalgic look back at "America of the Big Heart". It was 1961, before the deaths of JFK and MLK and before Vietnam.

UPCOTE, a self-styled gentleman of leisure who subsidises his state hand-outs with a little wheeling and dealing on the side meets the struggling SMYTHE and sets out to help his young protégé of fifty-three fulfil his true and hitherto well-concealed potential. With the help of Upcote’s indomitable Aunt Mabel and under the sceptical scrutiny of coin-obsessed café owner Bob, the two men set out to put their sartorial and cultural superiority on a sound financial footing. Dodging the slings and arrows of outraged punters our two heroes push, swerve and stumble onwards towards their dream...

Joe Simpson, with just his partner Simon Yates, tackled the unclimbed west face of the remote 21,000 foot Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in June of 1995. But before they reached the summit, disaster struck. A few days later, Simon staggered into base camp, exhausted and frostbitten, to tell their non-climbing companion that Joe was dead.

A firsthand account of hiking the entire Appalachian Trail in 2009. Starting in Georgia and continuing on foot nearly 2,200 miles to Maine, this is a collection of stories, adventures, and experiences from the Appalachian Trail. Anyone who has hiked or wishes to hike the AT will benefit from this easy and enjoyable listen.

When Pauline Piper reads in the local paper that her old schoolmate Marjorie has published a book and is going to sign copies of it in the local library, she suddenly remembers that she has always wanted to write one. Despite her admission that she has never been able to express herself very well in words, she enlists the help of her patient husband John, a great reader, unlike herself, and begins to pen her very first novel.In her candid account of the ups and downs of authorship, Pauline steers us ably through the process of writing her first work, from its inception to publication day ...

Nella primavera del 1976, a Hong Kong, un vecchio indovino cinese avverte l'autore di questo libro: "Attento! Nel 1993 corri un gran rischio di morire. In quell'anno non volare. Non volare mai". Dopo tanti anni Terzani non dimentica la profezia (che a suo modo si avvera...), ma anzi la trasforma in un'occasione per guardare al mondo con occhi nuovi: decide infatti di non prendere aerei per un anno, senza tuttavia rinunciare al suo mestiere di corrispondente.

A hard-charging CEO of a large enterprise, Ben Feder discovers that he is losing the very things that sustained him over his years of business success. Unsettled by his insight and determined to rebuild family relationships and rejuvenate his sense of purpose, he risks his career on a life-altering physical and emotional journey. Together with his wife and children, Feder sets off for an exotic island on a self-prescribed sabbatical year. That experience transforms them all.

In June 1944, the Nazis locked 18-year-old Dave Hersch into a railroad boxcar and shipped him from his hometown of Dej, Hungary, to Mauthausen Concentration Camp, the harshest, cruellest camp in the Reich. After 10 months in the granite mines of Mauthausen's nearby sub-camp, Gusen, he weighed less than 80 lbs., nothing but skin and bones. As Allied forces drew near Dave was forced to join a death march to Gunskirchen Concentration Camp, over 30 miles away. Soon after the start of the march, and more dead than alive, Dave summoned a burst of energy he did not know he had and escaped.

John Gierach demonstrates once again that fishing, when done right, is as much a philosophical pursuit as a sport. Gierach travels to Wyoming and Maine and points in between, searching out new fly-fishing adventures and savoring familiar waters with old friends. Along the way he meditates on the importance of good guides, the challenge of salmon fishing, and the zen of fishing alone. On a more serious note, he ponders the damaging effects of disasters both natural and man-made.

Two Years Before the Mast, written by Richard Henry Dana, provides a vivid account of "the life of a common sailor at sea". Dana sails from Boston, around Cape Horn, stopping in several ports along the California coast including San Diego, San Pedro, Santa Barbara, and San Francisco. On the return trip around Cape Horn in the middle of the Antarctic winter Dana describes terrifying storms and incredible beauty, giving vivid descriptions of icebergs and the scurvy that afflicts members of the crew.

Buckle up and get ready for a raw, unfiltered ride as Josh Goodman goes from being a guy who couldn't get a drink in a busy bar to building a multimillion-dollar technology company that lets guests pour their own beer, wine, and cocktails and pay by the ounce. Travel with Goodman to Ireland, where he spent a week driving around the entire country to secure his first business partners—who eventually tried to put him out of business. Then, visit northern Austria and discover how he landed the deal that brought his business back to life.

The audio edition of On the Grand Trunk Road is finally available, revised and updated with new material. Focusing on Coll's journeys in conflict-ridden India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Afghanistan as a bureau chief for The Washington Post, On the Grand Trunk Road reveals a little-seen area of the world where violence, corruption, and greed have had devastating effects on South Asians from all walks of life.

The City of Falling Angels opens on the evening of January 29, 1996, when a dramatic fire destroys the historic Fenice opera house. The loss of the Fenice, where five of Verdi's operas premiered, is a catastrophe for Venetians. Arriving in Venice three days after the fire, Berendt becomes a kind of detective - inquiring into the nature of life in this remarkable museum-city - while gradually revealing the truth about the fire.

Nelson Algren’s two travel writing books describe his journeys through the seamier sides of great American cities and the international social and political landscapes of the mid-1960s. Algren at Sea brings them together in one volume. Notes from a Sea Diary offers one of the most remarkable appraisals of Ernest Hemingway ever written. Who Lost an American? is a whirlwind spin through Paris and Playboy clubs, New York publishing and Dublin pubs, Crete, and Chicago.

Venice, 2020. As a pandemic rages across the globe, Zito Madu finds himself in a nearly deserted city, its walls and basilicas humming with strange magic. As he wanders a haunted landscape, we see him twist further into his own past: his family's difficult immigration from Nigeria to Detroit, his troubled relationship with his father, the sporadic joys of daily life and solitude, his experiences with migration, poverty, foreignness, racism, and his own rage and regret.

The Only Road North is the true-life adventure of a 9,000-mile journey across Africa taken by author Erik Mirandette, his brother, and two friends. When the travelers fall victim to a terrorist attack, Erik must struggle through grief and darkness to find his way back to a life lived for God.

This Autistic Girl Went to Japan is the inspiring story of a young woman who moved halfway around the world in pursuit of happiness. With humor and remarkable candor, Bianca describes the challenges of applying for a visa during a time of terrifying uncertainty, slogging through endless red tape, and the loneliness that comes with being a stranger in a strange land. Oh, and how she wound up evicting a bat from her new apartment, attending a Pokémon GO event with a bunch of middle-aged women, and discovering the best thrift store in all of Tokyo.

Growing up in Tehran in the 1960s, Terence Ward and his brothers were watched over by Hassan, the family’s cook, housekeeper, and cultural guide. After an absence of 30 years and much turmoil in Iran, Ward embarks on a quixotic pilgrimage with his family in search of their lost friend. However, as they set out on this improbable quest with no address or phone number, their only hope lies in their mother’s small black and white photograph taken decades before.

A wisdom-filled memoir that doubles as a sweeping travelogue reaching from Boston to Sardinia and back again. Gorgeously written and culturally astute. The Boston Globe. When a big-city journalist quits her dream job to move to a remote Italian island for love, she discovers a whole new life beyond the romantic fantasies of Italy spun by books and movies. Struggling to adapt to a different culture, she buys a quirky house in the Sardinian countryside, goes to art school and becomes obsessed with home improvement and renovation.