suroor alikhan
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Flâneuse—Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice and London: Lauren Elkin
Published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017, 336 pages Flâneur is a French word that means “one who wanders aimlessly”. It always refers to a man with time and money, who walks the streets of a city. Elkin appropriates the concept… Continue reading
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The Shooting Star—A Girl, Her Backpack and the World: Shivya Nath
Published by Penguin, 2018, 201 pages The Shooting Star starts with Shivya Nath deep in the Amazon rainforest (around the border between Ecuador and Peru), taking part in a shamanic cleansing ritual that involves drinking ayahuasca, an Amazonian plant that is… Continue reading
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Explore Europe on Foot—Your Complete Guide to Planning a Cultural Hiking Adventure: Cassandra Overby
Published by Mountaineers Books, 2018, 352 pages This book is another in a series on slow travel, an alternative to rushing around with crowds of people, trying to see everything as quickly as possible before moving on. This is all… Continue reading
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Her Fork in the Road—Women Celebrate Food and Travel: Edited by Lisa Bach
Published by Traveler’s Tales, 2001, 248 pages Food and travel—what more could you want? Her Fork in the Road is a collection of pieces by women writers including MFK Fisher, Isabel Allende, Francis Mayes, and Dervla Murphy. I love the… Continue reading
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Around the Bloc—My Life in Moscow, Beijing, and Havana: Stephanie Elizondo Griest
Published by Random House, 2004, 416 pages Growing up in Texas, Stephanie Elizondo Griest dreams of becoming a foreign correspondent and roaming the world. The advice of a journalist to learn Russian opens the door to what turns into a… Continue reading
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Alone Time—Four Cities, Four Seasons and the Pleasures of Solitude: Stephanie Rosenbloom
Published by Viking, 2018, 288 pages Slow down and take the time to look around you: that is the message of this book, an antidote to our busy and always-on culture. It is, as its title suggests, a paean to… Continue reading
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Travels with My Radio: Fi Glover
Published by Random House UK, 2002, 352 pages Fi Glover starts each day by tuning into the local radio station; it gives her a sense of being a part of the daily routine, no matter where she is. The idea of… Continue reading
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Destination Heartland—A Guide to Discovering the Midwest’s Remarkable Past: Cynthia Clampitt
Published by 3 Fields Books, 2022, 272 pages “Why Midwestern history? Because I love American history, and the history of the Midwest is, to a greater extent than most people realize, a key element of that history. … [P]eople need… Continue reading
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One More Croissant for the Road: Felicity Cloake
Published by Mudlark, 2019, 344 pages A travel book by a food writer—what more could you want? Felicity Cloake, inspired by the Tour de France, decides to do a tour herself with a slight difference. She would cycle around France,… Continue reading
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What Is Africa To Me? – Fragments of a True-to-Life Autobiography: Maryse Condé
Translated from French by Richard PhilcoxPublished by Seagull Books, 2017, 264 pages “Why is it that any attempt to write about one’s life ends up as a jumble of half-truths? … In the pages that follow…I shall try…to figure out… Continue reading
