I love to learn things from the books I read, and this book taught me so much— not only about the South Korean island Jeju, its matrifocal society of haenyeo (women divers), and its culture and traditions, but also about friendship, the horrors of war, loyalty, and grief. The Island of Sea Women is vividly imagined and …
Sujata Massey introduced us to Perveen Mistry in The Widows of Malabar Hill and has now released a sequel, The Satapur Moonstone. The mysteries are a delightful blend of thoughtful lawyering and high-stakes drawing room drama. Inspired by real-life lawyer Cornelia Sorabji (who also makes an appearance in the first book in the series), Perveen …
This heart-breaking novel is storytelling at its best! It follows Rachel, a young Hawaiian girl whose dreams are shattered the day she is taken from her family and sent to Kalaupapa, the quarantined settlement for lepers on the island of Moloka’i. Rich in history and characters, this special story will stay with you forever. And now after …
This book may be more for ex-kids like me, for whom the mysterious M. Sasek created a fascinating world of cities and landmarks in the ’50s and ’60s in his This Is… picture books. This Is Paris, This Is San Francisco, This Is Hong Kong, This Is Cape Canaveral: all told, he made eighteen locations his own, …
What a subtitle: “An Explorer’s Guide to the World’s Hidden Wonders!” This is beautiful, bizarre, intriguing, absurd– arm-chair travel at its most curious and delightful. I’m recommending this as the gift to get for the person who has everything and/or the most interesting person on your list. Life will never be boring with a book like …
If you are a foodie and Francophile, or if you like a rags-to-riches story, you should arm yourself with a strong cup of coffee and a croissant, curl up in an armchair, and tuck into Craig Carlson’s memoir, Pancakes in Paris. A bit like Gabrielle Hamilton of Blood, Bones and Butter, Carlson starts life treading the …
“The ‘Upstairs, Downstairs’ of Mediterranean yachting, told from the chef’s point of view.” –Carol Spurling, BookPeople of Moscow, Moscow, ID Upper crust Italian locavores, gorgeous ports-of-call, elegance, and deliciousness all in one true story? Plus a forward by Mario Batali? How had we not read this before? Let’s all get our copies at BookPeople or another independent …
Okay, my only complaint about this series is that Martin Walker does such an amazing job transporting you to the Dordogne region of France that I want to be there drinking wine and sampling the food (cooked by Bruno of course) and not here typing this. Setting that aside, I love these mysteries, you catch Martin Walker’s …
Janet Chapple, editor of Through Early Yellowstone: Adventuring by Bicycle, Covered Wagon, Foot, Horseback, and Skis, sat down with the publisher and editor of Granite Peak Publications to discuss her latest book, an anthology of travel accounts in the park dating from 1870 to 1916. Q: What inspired you to put together this book? A: …
It’s June and the weather here has been lovely–well, until today, which is cool and gray and occasionally rainy–and my thoughts have been on summertime. I don’t really do summertime things, being more of an indoors sort of person, but I like the idea of summertime things like gardening and barbecues and block parties and …
