Customer Reviews

Literary Trips: Following in the Footsteps of Fame

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a book to savor in a cigar lounge...in the corner of a jazz club...in front of a softly crackling fire at home. Or in a hammock under a royal palm in the deep, deep south.

I started out by nestling with the book into our oversized, down-filled sofa - and ended up traveling through one of the best reads of my life. Several times, I startled my husband with cries of "No kidding...Wow...I didn't know that...Ohmigod..." as I discovered new places in the hearts of my favorite authors. And delved into the lives of others I knew little about.

Literary Trips probes into the past, yet is formatted for the present. We're all used to reading in chunks now - short, self-contained sections that are complete, independent modules. And this book is totally "today" in that respect. Each chapter, written by a different person, is a complete story - gift-wrapped with its own special signature. Each has its own flavor, its own style, its own finds. Every writer has unearthed amusing tidbits and lively tales that add richness and depth to well researched and beautifully written prose.

The book is also an excellent travel guide for following in those famous footsteps. Each module contains a practical reference section listing hotels and other stomping grounds of famous feet ("Literary Sites"; "Literary Sleeps"). Each section also describes how to get to those grounds and provides useful tips and background information.

My favorite parts are the little surprises throughout. For example, did you know that: § Hemingway dedicated his Nobel Prize for literature to the patron saint of the basilica in Santiago de Cuba? § Ian Fleming wrote the James Bond novels at Goldeneye, his home in Jamaica, and named 007 after the local author of a book on birds? § When Ayn Rand was writing Atlas Shrugged, which took 12 years, she didn't leave her apartment for an entire month?

Another of the book's delightful dimensions is a smattering of recipes that could form a menu for a literary memorial party. You could honor D.H. Lawrence with his dandelion wine; Hemingway with double daiquiris; Mistry with Dhansak; and Sinclair Lewis with his "Sinful Christmas Cookies".

I'm always looking for inspiration for my own writing, and Lit Trips provides it on many fronts. Much of it comes from seeing so many authors "under one cover" - an excellent way to compare styles, to link lives, to see how they made their magic. But I was no less inspired by the talent of the book's contributing writers.

Literary Trips: Following In The Footsteps Of Fame is a superbly presented compendium of observations, adventures, and travels of and by some of the best loved writers as they trekked around the world. A magnificent armchair travelogue, Literary Trips is divided as the world is: Africa to Australasia (Paul Bowles, T. E. Lawrence, Rohinton Mistry, Bruce Chatwin); North America: West (Malcolm Lowry, The Beats, D. H. Lawrence, Garrison Keillor and Sinclair Lewis); North America: East (Tennessee Williams, Margaret Mitchell and Tom Wolfe, Ayn Rand, Mark Twain, Elizabeth Smart); Caribbean and Latin America (Ernest Hemingway, Ian Fleming and Noel Coward, John Stephens and Frederick Catherwood); Great Britain and Ireland (W. B. Yeats, Jane Urquhart and the Bronte Sisters, A. A. Milne, Agatha Christie and Jane Austen); Continental Europe (Knut Hamsun, The Lost Generation, Mary Shelley). Highly recommended for both school and community library collections, Literary Trips is enhanced for the reader with a section on biographies and a "user friendly" index. A novel and original feature of this publication is that any of the chapters are available as separate, individual e-texts and downloadable from the GreatestEscapes.com website.