John Hatt’s Eland was the first of a wave of travel lists that emerged in the early 1980s, quickly joined by Century Travellers, the Penguin Classic Travel Library, Picador and Virago. It can never define exactly what it’s looking for in a book until it stumbles across it, but it needs to be observant of others, capable of summing up the spirit of a place and catching the moment on the wing … as well as being funny, wry, intelligent, humane, tragic, lyrical, universal, self-deprecating and idiosyncratic. And the whole book must be held together by a page-turning gift for story telling.
Weldon was mapping the deserts of Egypt when war broke out. Working from out of a steam yacht based on Port Said or Famagusta, he ran a network of spies and confidential agents onto the Levant coast behind Turkish lines. He was a fluent Arabic speaker and could conduct personal interviews on the shore, as well as landing and taking off agents – all
First published in 1933, Brazilian Adventure is Peter Fleming’s account of his expeditionary search for the lost Colonel. Peter Fleming was the brother of Ian Fleming, author of the James Bond series and was literary editor of The Times.
Veronica was not a casual traveler but a young musician married to a scholar. She was determined to make use of her time in Afghanistan and break out of the charmed circle of the expatriate academic and make real friendships with local women.
This book chronicles Forster’s infatuation and exasperation, fascination, and amusement at this idiosyncratic court, leading us with him to its heart and the eight- day festival of Gokul Ashtami, marking the birth of Krishna, where we see His Highness Maharajah Sir Tukoji Rao III dancing before the altar "like David before the Ark."
Guy Kennaway’s novel about Jamaican life and culture is set in the fictional village of Angel Beach. It is an affectionate and hilarious description of a small community where everyone knows everyone’s business, poverty is a way of life and dreams of escape trickle through fingers.
This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
Strictly Necessary Cookies
Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.
If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.
John Hatt’s Eland was the first of a wave of travel lists that emerged in the early 1980s, quickly joined by Century Travellers, the Penguin Classic Travel Library, Picador and Virago. It can never define exactly what it’s looking for in a book until it stumbles across it, but it needs to be observant of others, capable of summing up the spirit of a place and catching the moment on the wing … as well as being funny, wry, intelligent, humane, tragic, lyrical, universal, self-deprecating and idiosyncratic. And the whole book must be held together by a page-turning gift for story telling. 
