Improviser

I'm not talking guidebooks but books about someone's travels. So for example any of Bill Bryson's books or Paul Theroux's travel books.

So what is your favourite or favourities if you have any. Did any inspire you to visit a place as a result of reading it? Do you regularly look for books to read before or during a trip that pertain to the trip you are planning or on?

I've read a lot but I'd have to say that John Berendt's 'Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil' as well as his 'The City of Falling Angels.' Somehow they are in a different league to Bryson or Theroux.

HappyTrvlr

"Blue Highways" by William Least Heat Moon, traveling the USA via the lesser roads.

Bellarosa70032

On a different note, I love taking Mark Twain's The Innocents Abroad when I travel to some parts of Europe. Some of he scams and tourists' traps are the same, even after 120+ years.

Improviser

I should have added, not necessarily actual travel books. Both those by Berendt I mentioned above are about an actual event that occurred in the cities (Savannah & Venice) but give such a picture of the city that they can inspire someone to want to visit the place.

I read Blue Highways way back in the early 80s Happy Trvlr. A true classic indeed.

Have you read James Michener's 'The Drifters' Bellarosa? That one inspired me back in the mid-70s to go on my own first long term trip.

mgnapoli

Bill Bryson's "Notes from a Small Island" provides modern incites to England. Loved the book.

centraleurope

Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere by Jan Morris.

Travels with a Donkey in the Cevannes by Robert Louis Stevenson

The Sea and Sardinia by DH Lawrence

And of course I have to include Patrick Leigh Fermor A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water.

Approach_Guides

Going to second Bellarosa70032's recommendation for Innocents Abroad. Phenomenal read.
We also love any book by John Julius Norwich. Excellent writer who brings history to life.

Improviser

Magnopoli, that book covers more than just England. Are you saying the part on England was more interesting to you than the rest of the book?

MmePerdu

I, too, love Patrick Leigh Fermor. The 3rd volume of the trilogy, first 2 mentioned above, should be out soon:

http://patrickleighfermor.wordpress....e-broken-road/

I also love Eric Hansen's books starting with the first, 'Stranger in the Forest' about his walk across Borneo. And William Dalrymple's about India. And Rosemary Mahoney's 'Down the Nile: Alone in a Fisherman's Skiff'. And many more.

TPAYT

"A YEAR OF SUNDAYS" by Edward D. Webster.

A man takes his blind wife and sixteen year old cat on a year long trip through many European countries. Quite an entertaining journey.

As to your questions, I do regularly search out books that take place in locations I've visited or want to visit. Some of the fiction is good if it describes in depth the place it's in but my favorites are memoirs or "we bought a house/apt. in France, Italy, etc" type of books.

Another recent memoir I enjoyed was "LIVING IN A FOREIGN LANGUAGE" by Michael Tucker. He and his wife buy a house in Umbria, Italy. It's very descriptive of the area and I would love to travel there someday.

centraleurope

William Dalyrymple's book on India is City of the Djinns...
...

MmePerdu

Re Dalrymple's, yes, that's the one about his residence in Delhi but there are several more. I meant all of them. 'City of Djinns' is excellent.

jaja

"Last of the Donkey Pilgrims" by Kevin O'Hara.

taconictraveler

Amazing what one can learn on Fodor's!!

MmePerdu: A thousand thanks for your reference to Patrick Leigh Fermor's website. I had no idea. I have just spent the last hour perusing it, both happy and sad to read more and more about his life.

He has been one of my "hero writers" for a very long time. I had no idea that the third volume of his trilogy would ever come out. I have read many of his books,and he is in my Pantheon of handsome English writers, along with John Julius Norwich.

Improviser

There there is 'Captain Correli's Mandolin' by Louis de Bernieres or Peter Mayle's 'A Year in Provence.'

Improviser

Or pretty much anything by Steinbeck.

Travels with Charley being perhaps the most appropriate to list but Cannery Row being one of my own all time favourite books of any kind.

MmePerdu

Taconictraveler, we've been waiting a very long time for it. I've promised myself I won't worry about what might have been a bit different if he'd managed to finish it himself. He was a consummate procrastinator (or perfectionist, maybe the same thing) so we're just lucky to get it at all.

StCirq

LOVE Patrick Leigh Fermor!

Brunelleschi's Dome, by Ross King

The Pillars of Hercules, by Paul Theroux

Out of Africa, by Isak Dinesen (Karen von Blixen)

Do not like Peter Mayle at all.

msteacher

Perhaps not appropriate for the Europe forum, but the best book I read about a place while I was in that place was "River of Doubt" (about Teddy Roosevelt's travels on the Amazon) while I was in the Amazon myself.

But to answer the question with a European focus, I would have to say "Beautiful Ruins," a novel set in the area around Portovenere and the Cinque Terre, and "London" by Edward Rutherford, which gives a great history of the city through the lens of one fictional family.

tom18

NONFICTION - FRANCE

French Kids Eat Everything, by Karen DiBillon
Bringing Up Bebe, by Pamela Druckerman
- good books about French culture with emphasis on eating habits and child-raising

Buying a Piece of Paris, by Ellie Nielsen
- an Australian woman’s adventure in buying an apartment in Paris

NONFICTION - ITALY
Italian Neighbors, by Tim Parks
The Seasons of Rome, by Paul Hofmann
- both books give interesting and complementary insights into Italian culture

FICTION - FRANCE
French Fried and Death A L’Orange, by Nancy Fairbanks
- fictional mystery series whose heroine is a American travel writer. French Fried is set in Lyon and Avignon and gives a lot of good information about those two cities. Death a L’Orange is about Normandy and the Loire Valley but is not as informative as the other two.