Le Road Trip

One of my favorite books  of the past few years was a little talked about memoir/sketchbook about a traveling woman who decided to stay put: When Wanderers Cease to Roam.  Her book and drawings and musings about life off the road were so captivating and so thought provoking that it sent me on several writing journeys of my own.  I give it as a gift quite frequently, and I use it for prompts for the many writing circles I run.

When Vivian Swift published this second book modeled much after the first, I knew without looking that I wanted a copy.  She recounts her roadtrip to France that she takes with her new husband.  What they see, where they go and those little travel adventures you have when visiting a foreign country.

Le Road Trip: A Traveler's Journal of Love and France is much like Wanderers in that it is a beautiful book with quirky observations, lovely sketches of all the author does and sees, a breakdown of the phases of a trip from beginning to the inevitable bad travel days to the parting.  This journal is full of reminiscences of past trips, quotes, and the little details that many over look: a mermaid door, the color of the sunset, a cat at a rooming house,  a particular cheese and wine at a cafe.

Ms Swift is taking a post wedding trip with her new husband, a man who is clearly her kindred spirit, so this book in a way is something of a love story--or perhaps a love tribute.   Because of the eclectic, poetic nature of the book, I am a little unclear as to how long the trip was and some of the day to day itinerary was a tad jumbled.  But it really did not matter.  The whole journal was a tribute to adventurers and travelers every where.  It made me a lot nostalgic for the road and anxious to try my hand at my high school french in Paris.  Everything is better with croissant.

Fun fact: did you know that France is the number one tourist destination by far?

This is another lovely book worth owning. Buy it if you can.

Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar

One hot afternoon during the era in which you've gotten yourself ridiculously tangled up in heroin, you will be riding the bus and thinking what a worthless piece of crap you are when a little girl will get on the bus holding the strings of two purple balloons. She'll offer you one of the balloons, but you won't take it because you believe you no longer have a right to such tiny beautiful things. You're wrong.  You do.  --Cheryl Strayed

I have always been an avid reader of advice columns.  I came of age reading Dear Abby and Ann Landers, loved the dry wit of Miss Manners, found special wisdom in consumer help columns and most recently, fell in love with the modern practical humor and wisdom of Dear Prudence.

I read them religiously, pose my own questions (in my head) frequently, and curiously wait to see what their responses will be. What will mine be?  What set of moral values do they set their standards by and do they follow them?  Advice columns are an endless source of story and inspiration.

As you may recall, a few months back, I read a great travel memoir by a new writer named Cheryl Strayed.  Her voice was clear and compelling as she told her story of backpacking on the Pacific Coast Trail, and I looked forward to her next writing.  I stumbled upon it this week in the bookstore and bought it without question.  (This is how much I like her writing.  I knew I would want to own it and keep it.)

Cheryl Strayed writes an on-line advice column under the name Dear Sugar.  Dear Sugar writes clear compelling advice to her readers (in response to letters of course) but also writes her own memoirs and tiny stories as a way of illustrating life lessons.  Nothing here is boring.  All her responses feel spot on and you sense her empathy and conviction through the power of her words.  I loved every letter and every response.  She eclipses any other advice columnist in beauty and compelling argument.  I am going to buy these by the bundle and give them as gifts for all occasions.  Marriage, baby, job crisis, death in the family, middle age crazies...it is all right here. Look no further. These are real letters from real writers and her responses are her own: a collection of columns that is both help, self help and memoir.  Look no further for a great summer read.

This is the best book I have read this summer, and I put Ms. Strayed on my list of writers to see if I am ever able. She is so honest and forthright about her own failings and grief that you cannot help but love her.  The epigraph at the top of the page--written in second person--is her own story.

 You can borrow this from me but if you wait long enough, I might buy it for you.

The stack next to the bed

I cleaned my room today and made two large stacks of books that had been collecting under the bed. They are from a few years of books fairs, borrowings, and shopping sprees--when Borders went out of business.  I am humbled by all the reading I have to do: great stories, poetry, memoirs, how-to books, diaries, cookbooks, and curiosities.

I loved stacking these up and picking out which to read first.  I sorted them by genre:  took the writing books to my desk, the kids books to their rooms, and everything else placed on shelves in my bedroom and study.  I left a small stack of 5 books for my current reading.

I found a lot of treasures under the bed, things I had forgotten about.  It sparked some imagination and intrigue.  Its a rainy day and it felt good to visit old friends.

In Defense of Food: An Eaters Manifesto by Michael Pollan

I could not wait to purchase Michael Pollan's new book In Defense of Food: An Eaters Manifesto. It is a short read and builds upon many of the themes he explores in depth in Omnivores Dilemma, but it is not ever a rehash of Omnivores Dilemma. It is fresh and original.

After years of reading and taking in articles and ideas about nutrition and nutrition science, it was enlightening to finally understand that the emperor has no clothes. Nutrition science is ruining food and the enjoyment of food and is largely bogus.

Pollan probably could better support his thesis, but it was enough evidence for me. I also appreciated the last part with recommendations on how to eat. Not a diet, but more advice for shopping and living that will bring you the most health and the most enjoyment out of food.

I find Pollan's works all to be fascinating discussions of food and the implications of consumption in the larger world. I highly recommend this.