Reading a compilation of travel essays by authors Joyce Carol Oates, Tea Obreht,  Peter Matthiessen, Alexander McCall Smith, Isabel Allende, Frances Mayes and Pico Iyer sounds like a dream come true for any addicted travel reader. Add in other scribes who have been awarded or nominated for the Man Booker or Whitbread Prize, the National Book Award, Orange Prize for Fiction and additional literary prizes and Better than Fiction, edited by Don George, should be a winning proposition. You might assume that this book contains lyrical literary facsimiles of perfect travel experiences as described by some very talented writers.

But, wait! Those of you intending to kick off your shoes and drink in the evocative descriptions of the highest mountains, clearest blue seas or most charming world villages are in for a bit of a shock. Although there is a bit of this, most of the  essays are thought provoking and memorable riffs on travel, but not normally what one would think of as the consummate vacation. Consider some of the entries:

-a young woman going down into an old dangerous mine in Wales alone for contemplation and quiet.

- a trip to Mexico City in a VW bus with high school buddies where they were welcomed into a working class area and participated in a neighborhood US vs Mexico soccer match.

-visiting former Princeton friend, Carlos, an enigmatic revolutionary, in his home country of Nicaragua during Somoza’s reign, after which Carlos disappeared during that country’s revolution.

-an inadvertent  holiday in Malawi at a deserted abandoned resort  near  a shimmering lake next to a tribal village.

-a frigid trip to remote Antarctica with a bittersweet aftermath.

-standing up to a military goon as he shakes down passengers for a ‘transit fee’ on a train in rural Namibia.

-finding solace on a trip to India after the heartbreaking death of a daughter.

Other essays are lighter and humorous, but as a whole this collection should appeal to others who have read The Lunatic Express by Carl Hoffman http://www.heightslibrary.org/wordpress/travelinrat/?tag=the-lunatic-express in which he realistically describes the harrowing modes of transportation in developing countries. Together, these two books may change your view of travel but will certainly not dampen it.

Presenting a list of culinary fiction and nonfiction titles to make your mind and mouth water.

The Language of Baklava by Diana Abu-Jaber

Life, on the Line: A Chef’s Story of Chasing Greatness, Facing Death, and Redefining the Way We Eat by Grant Achatz

Heat: An Amateur’s Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta Maker, and Apprentice to A Dante-quoting Butcher in Tuscany by Bill Buford

Keeping the Feast: One Couple’s Story of Love, Food, and Healing in Italy by Paula Butturini

The Wife of the Chef: The True Story of a Restaurant and Romance by Courtney Febbroriello

Alone in the Kitchen with An Eggplant: Confessions of Cooking for One and Dining Alone edited by Jenni Ferrari-Auler

The Sharper your Knife, the Less You Cry: Love, Laughter, and Tears at the World’s Most Famous Cooking School by Kathleen Flinn

Try This: Traveling the Globe without Leaving the Table by Danyelle Freeman

Blood, Bones, & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of A Reluctant Chef by Gabrielle Hamilton

Paris in Love: A Memoir by Eloisa James

Eating Mud Crabs in Kandahar: Stories of Food during Wartime by the World’s Leading Correspondents edited by Matt McAllester

The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen by Jacques Pepin

Charlotte Au Chocolat: Memories of A Restaurant Girlhood by Charlotte Silver

Le Road Trip: A Traveler’s Journal of Love and France by Vivian Swift

The Spice Necklace: My Adventures in Caribbean Cooking, Eating, and Island Life by Ann Vanderhoof

Licking the Spoon: A Memoir of Food, Family, and Identity by Candace Walsh

A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table by Molly Wizenberg

Would you agree to take part in an anonymous survey on marriage at the same time you were questioning and evaluating the sustainability of your own relationship? This is what Wife 22′s Alice Buckle must evaluate as her decades old marriage seems to hit a brick wall.

Faced with her children’s’ adolescence and their decreased need for her guidance and attention and her husband’s seemingly dismissive and distracted demeanor, she begins to question the very foundation of her life. Becoming a participant in the marriage survey highlights her uneasiness and unsettled feelings rather than providing clarity about where she is headed with her marriage and family.

Cleverly constructed with emails between the survey’s administrator and Alice, these missives soon take on a tone that may appear to be too familiar and friendly. But, the freedom and abandon the survey releases in Alice makes sharing her thoughts with an unknown stranger suddenly liberating and exciting. She becomes the study’s 22th participant which also lends itself to the book’s title.

Many chapters begin with only Alice’s answers to the survey’s questions leaving the reader to guess what the questions were. This amusing literary device is quite effective. It makes the reader assume what they believe the questions to be and they only find out much later what the surprising questions actually are.

Will participating in the survey help or hurt Alice’s marriage? How will her growing attraction with the anonymous survey administrator play out? Melanie Gideon’s modern take on a marriage heading south is a breezy, sometimes poignant, sometimes hilarious rendering of one of the most complex relationships known to man.  Surprisingly charming, this is one book(and survey)you will want to share with your friends.

Psychopath or Sociopath? I tend to get these two terms confused. But, in Gillian Flynn’s best-selling novel, Gone Girl, it’s apparent that one of the characters fits one of those conditions to a tee-but which one? In a page turning thriller filled with rising tension, an unsettled feeling slowly seeps through the seemingly normal relationship at the heart of the story.

Using the viewpoints of both Nick and his missing wife Amy as they approach their fifth wedding anniversary, each of their voices attempt to convince the reader that their reality and point of view is the correct one. They both artfully set up their story, going back and forth from the beginning of their relationship and continuing through Amy’s disappearance.

From the outside looking in, the reader discovers that their relationship and marriage, while convincingly loving and fulfilling to the casual observer at the beginning, may have some disturbing components. Amy’s diary entries provide a glimpse into the life of an overachieving young woman who possibly may have way too much on her plate. Nick’s evasive actions and the sketchy answers he provides to the police make one wonder what he’s hiding. Is it possible he’s a killer?

The stunning conclusion will evoke differing responses from readers ranging from disbelief, sympathy, confusion and disgust as we are reminded that life is not always as it seems. There is much to discuss with your friends, neighbors, book clubs and coworkers. You can decide for yourself if there is a psychopath or sociopath lurking on the pages you will be quickly turning.

Just in the nick of time, along comes a book that enlightens and entertains in a surprisingly nonpartisan and detailed way. The Presidents Club: Inside the World’s Most Exclusive Fraternity by Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy should be a welcome antidote to anyone  troubled by this year’s brutal Presidential campaign. The ‘Club’ consist of ex-Presidents who are called on by the current President when assistance is needed with Foreign Affairs, public relations  or a domestic situation.

The Club was initiated by Herbert Hoover and Harry Truman during Dwight Eisenhower’s Presidency. The two former Presidents from opposing parties joined forces to help feed those starving in Europe following World War II. They took it upon themselves to close ranks and offer any assistance that the newly elected Eisenhower needed. The Club has continued down through the subsequent Presidencies as anywhere from 2 to 5 living ex Presidents have been called upon by the sitting President to circle the wagon.Their love of country and their own reputations in history have some times gone hand in hand, but the protection of the Presidency, no matter what the party affiliation of those involved, is most paramount.

 Since only an elite few know firsthand what the pressures and challenges of being elected the leader of the free world are,  the ex-Presidents have continued to come together through the decades for a variety of reasons. Whether it was helping JFK get out of The Bay of Pigs debacle, counseling Nixon that his resignation would be best for the country, or helping Clinton face his impeachment charges, these stories are revealed with the utmost care and precision. Richly illustrated and footnoted, there are stories and points of view most people have never heard before. You may have your own opinion of these men but reading about the unusually warm relationships Bill Clinton shared with both Gerald Ford and  George H.W. Bush confirms that party lines can be crossed because personal connections and respect should not stop at each party’s door.

Put your personal ideologies and partisanship aside and enjoy this historically significant book. You will be hard pressed to find a more evenhanded political book on the market today.

Hauntingly atmospheric, The Cove by Ron Rash takes places during the end of the First World War in the North Carolina Appalachian mountains.The land itself is depressing with a river that slowly meanders through the gloom as subtly as the quietly disturbing story unfolds. Outcasts Laurel and her brother, wounded war veteran, Hank live in a rustic cabin near a dark and forbidding cove that is avoided by other residents in the area. Laurel’s birthmark is considered the mark of a witch which contributes to her whole family being shunned over the years.

After Laurel finds a man suffering from dozens of yellow jacket stings laying  semiconscious in the woods, she brings him home to the dank cabin where she nurses him back to health. When Walter, seemingly a deaf mute, is well enough, he begins to help one armed Hank around their land, building fences, clearing land and digging a well. It’s always been his intention to stay just a little while, but Laurel is in no hurry to have the enigmatic flute playing stranger leave and has no idea that the secret he carries will rend all their lives apart.

Enter unpopular army recruiter Chauncey Feith, who managed to avoid the draft, perhaps because he is the son of the local bank’s president. Feith attempts to rally support for returning, wounded veterans as WW I nears its end.  His fear mongering vigilantism, disguised as patriotism, makes life miserable for a local professor  teaching German at the nearby college.  He also helps incite violence near the cove and the cabin where Laurel and Hank reside. Unfounded fears and superstitions put in play a chain of events that have irrevocable consequences for the characters and the readers in this seductive story.

Having read many travel memoirs, this one can only be described as an unexpected delight. Who wouldn’t want to visit France? If you’ve been on the fence, may I suggest you get yourself a copy of Le Road Trip: A Traveler’s Journal of Love and France by Vivian Swift? Browsing through this delightful book will help you make up your mind about planning a trip to the most visited country in the world. You may occasionally feel a bit like a voyeur since the book often reads like  someone’s personal diary or journal but this only adds to its charm.

The talented Swift has put together a  compendium of entertaining information  mixed with everything you would need to know about travelling to Paris and the rest of  France. Here, you will find French travel observations and advice, anecdotes, quotes, historical tidbits, cultural explanations, tips on restaurants, museums and gardens. One of my favorite travel tips is to engage the French in a conversation about their dogs. You may find the seemingly unapproachable French person to be down right friendly when asked about their pet!

The watercolor illustrations and line drawings, all done by the author, are what really make this an enchanting book and I suspect that once you read it, you may want to make sure you have a copy of  it in your personal library. You will pick it up again and again to browse through and happily rejoin Swift as she travels this beautiful and most visited country with her new husband.

Reading Eloisa James’s Paris in Love: A Memoir is much like getting a postcard from your dearest friend as she briefly describes her year long trip to Paris. Or, it may feel a bit like reading interesting snippets of her diary or journal.  James gathered the blog and twitter posts she wrote while abroad as the genesis of her book, and the result is this small but charming volume that packs an unforgettable punch. Her writing meanders through her Paris year winding circuitously around her every day events. Just when you can’t imagine why she’s interrupted her last thought with a seemingly random unrelated statement, she ties them all together in a cohesive bow, leaving the reader waiting for more.

James and her husband both took year long sabbaticals after she recovered from breast cancer surgery and moved their family to Paris. As they settle in, the children are less than thrilled to be in a new country and new school where they do not know the language and have no friends. But, as their year progresses, each family member makes adjustments to their new living situation and the family shares many once in a lifetime moments together.

Visiting  landmarks and museums, shopping at the green grocer, the corner butcher or Parisian stores, attending Mass at a centuries old church, interacting with the homeless and preparing for Christmas in a foreign country are all woven into enchanting prose. The every day mundane encounters with family and friends are retold with such endearing appeal and heart  that I grew attached to the author and her family, including their overweight(make that obese) dog.

C’est dommage that the ending came so soon! My hope is that Ms. James will take another sabbatical in the near future and again write about her adventures bringing along her new best friends-her readers. Qu’est-ce un livre charmante!

The Spice Necklace My Adventures in Caribbean Cooking, Eating, and Island Life by Ann Vanderhoof  follows Ann and her husband as they travel around the Caribbean islands making friends and soaking up all that  island life has to offer. The islands couldn’t pay an advertising or marketing firm to market their lifestyle and their exquisite natural beauty and bring them to life as eloquently as this talented writer does.

Here are some of the things you will learn and experience:

• If you eat wild goats in the Dominican Republic you will be surprised by the strong oregano taste. This is not from a chef’s over seasoning but because the goats chomp endlessly on the oregano bushes which cover the island.
• The very hot pepper sauce made on the island of Trinidad comes from the congo pepper which, on the Scoville pepper heat index, measures 300,000 units compared to the hot Mexican jalapeno which comes in at 8,000 units.
• Coconut water, a popular beverage on several islands, was used in World War II. It was given intravenously to soldiers in emergencies in place of plasma because coconut water has the same electrolyte balance as blood.
• Sea moss, a seaweed variety, is revered on the islands as a male sexual aid similar to Viagra. It is added to soups, drinks and salads to increase sexual prowess.
• Of all the players in Major League Baseball, 1 out of 9 are from the Dominican Republic.

Even those who have travelled to islands in the Caribbean will be charmed by the stories and anecdotes that Ann has garnered during her stays in Grenada, Dominica, Trinidad, St. Lucia, St Marten and other islands. Her love of the area is reminiscent of Melinda Blanchard’s books, A Trip to the Beach: Living on Island Time in the Caribbean and At Blanchard’s Table: A Trip to the Beach Cookbook, both of which contain enough color pictures to ensure many readers will book their next trip to the lovely island of Anguilla to visit the Blanchards and their Anguillan restaurant. Together, these three books are utterly delightful armchair travelling at its finest. So, pull up a chair, make yourself a cool drink and feel the cool breezes as you happily turn the pages.

Leila Aboulela’s book, Lyrics Alley, is set in 1950s Sudan and follows the lives of the wealthy Abuzaid family as their country prepares for political independence from Britain and Egypt.   The Abuzaid family is caught right in the middle of the drama since their business empire has benefited greatly through their British and Egyptian connections. Love, loss, tragedy and injustice all creep into the storyline making this an arresting family saga. And, in the background, the political changes sweeping the country are ever present. Will Sudan embrace all that modern technology can offer them or cling to the mores and culture of their Arabic heritage?

I may have given this book 4 stars if I had not read that some reviewers were prematurely comparing the author to the highly esteemed Egyptian novelist and Nobel Laureate for Literature, Naguib Mahfouz, and his monumental work, The Cairo Trilogy. Mahfouz’s trilogy shows a greater maturity and a much deeper scope and breadth than Aboulela’s story, perhaps because it was written over many years of a long and celebrated writing life while Aboulela is still in the midst of creating  a very promising career.

Both authors represent the much-needed Arabic voice and point of view in contemporary literature and offer similar themes of domestic and family life as portrayed in the male dominated cultures of Egypt and Sudan. And, it is especially important to have  representation of realistic voices of Muslim women which Aboulela so competently depicts.

Although Aboulela still has a way to go before she enters the same literary landscape and brilliance as Mahfouz, she is well on the path to making that happen and will certainly act as an inspiration for future female Muslim novelists. Lyrics Alley, builds on her portfolio of her other books which include Minaret and The Translator.