Alice Steinbach, an American reporter, divorced with two adult sons makes the decision to take a sabbatical from her job and travel. Her travelling is confined within this book to Paris, London, Oxford and Italy.
Whilst this is not so much a travelogue, it is written in a gentle style and is very much conversational. Alice has a wonderful ability to make friends with strangers and very much embraces the opportunity she has taken to reaffirm her position and life.
Whilst in London, Alice visited the Gertrude Jekyll exhibition that was held in London at the Museum of Garden History. By coincidence I visited the same exhibition, as Gertrude Jekyll is responsible for the gardens at one of my ancestral houses in rural Surrey.
I simply loved this book. The way that Alice was having a conversation with her readers. I loved that she sent herself postcards whilst she was solo travelling and maintained a journal through the experience.
It reminded me of the solo travelling I did in my early 20s and the people that I met along the way and spent time with. Several of those people I am still in touch with, others have fallen by the wayside and yet remain entwined with my travels. It was those travels that probably defined and shaped me in adulthood.
About a third of the way through the book I found that I need a note pad as a few thoughts and book titles came to mind. I found that I wanted to know more about her travels and did she keep in touch with anyone she met on her journey, and what happened to her relationship with Naohiro?
As I sat to write this review I decided to see what other books Alice had written, I was very sad to see that Alice passed away in March 2012 and I felt a real sadness for someone I had never met or corresponded with, yet we had made a connection through her writing.
Hello Julie, yes, I see what you mean about this book, and your sense of personal loss when an author passed away. I had a similar experience when, impressed by an article I read on a blog, I contacted the author, only to receive a kind email explaining that she had died some time ago. her family had left her blog online because it was so fresh and alive and they wanted people to go on reading and enjoying her words. It was strange to feel so sad about someone I'd never known.
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