travel

The Queen Who Came in from the Cold

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The Queen Who Came in from the Cold: Her Majesty the Queen Investigates by S. J. Bennett

This book is the fifth mystery in one of my favorite series, featuring Queen Elizabeth II and her assistant private secretaries. This one is set in 1961, as Buckingham Palace is preparing for a state visit from the Kennedys. Before that, Queen Elizabeth, Prince Philip and their staff are going to Italy. I especially enjoyed the scenes set on the royal train and the royal yacht, HMY Britannia. A number of years ago I got to tour Britannia, now a floating museum in Edinburgh, and it was lovely to picture the family quarters while reading this mystery.

On the train, Sandra Pole, a temporary lady-in-waiting to Princess Margaret, says that she saw a body flung into a pond from the train, but no one else saw anything, and is she a reliable witness? It may have been too dark for her to see much, at any rate. The Queen, along with her assistant private secretary, Joan McGraw, has some experience in solving crimes without taking any of the credit. Joan, a former codebreaker at Bletchley Park, does some investigating. A missing photographer, possibly connected to Princess Margaret’s new husband, could be the victim. But where to search? The Queen interviews a clergyman with a passion for trains and railways who has some useful information.

The Space Race and the Cold War come into play, as a possible defector was in contact with the missing photographer, and the Britannia may be involved. Scenes in Rome and Venice add to the story, and the pace and danger intensifies. While Joan is a fine sleuth, Queen Elizabeth is the star here, and it’s great fun to see her in the 1961 setting, and also while trying to keep secrets from Prince Philip, who is very supportive. We don’t see much of the Queen’s corgis here, but there is a very naughty chihuahua on board the train, and the Queen Mother makes an appearance. The previous book, A Death in Diamonds, is set in 1957, while the first three, beginning with The Windsor Knot, are set in 2016 and 2017.

Brenda

North to the Future

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North to the Future: An Offline Adventure Through the Changing Wilds of Alaska by Ben Weissenbach

Young journalist Ben Weissenbach, when not scrolling on his phone, is fascinated by Alaska. At 20, he spent the summer of 2019 with climate scientist and adventurer Roman Dial trekking across the eastern Brooks Range. During another trip to Alaska he experienced an Arctic winter fortnight on Kenji Yohikawa’s off-grid cabin near Fairbanks, tending to his reindeer. Ben also flew over part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge with glaciologist Matt Nolan, occasionally dealing with smoke-filled skies.

The longest section of the book is about a hiking and pack rafting expedition in the Western Brooks Range in 2021, led by Roman Dial, studying the spread of spruce trees in the Arctic. Many adventures and misadventures are described, including encounters with wolves and grizzly bears, along with his struggle as to simply be present in the amazing expanse of Alaska. I very much enjoy the combination of real-life adventure, travel, science, and memoir, and look forward to reading what he’s up to next.

Brenda

Murder on the S.S. Cleopatra

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Murder on the S.S. Cleopatra by Sara Rosett

This historical mystery is the sequel to Murder Among the Pyramids, with a third book planned. In 1924, Blix Windway, an adventurous lady traveler, embarks on the Blue Lotus Line steamer S.S. Cleopatra for a cruise down the Nile, as does her new friend Hildy Honeycutt. Blix takes photos and gives lectures about her travels, occasionally funding her travel by working as a paid companion.

Blix has a small but charming cabin, while Hildy has a much larger one. Blix is startled to meet Rafe Briarcliff on board, the handsome but annoying man who shared some of her recent adventures in Cairo and at the pyramids. Rafe is travelling undercover, assessing the ship and crew for the Blue Lotus Line. Hildy gets a couple of anonymous threatening notes and reluctantly shares a big secret with Blix. They get to know the other travelers before a suspicious death, or possibly two, occurs.

The captain asks Mr. Briarcliff and Blix to interview all of the travelers in hopes that they can solve the mystery before the ship arrives at Luxor. The ship is described in just the right amount of detail, as are the travelers, crew, and their activities. Rosett really did her research on 1920s Egyptian tourism, but shares just enough of what she learned to enhance the mystery, not overwhelm it. Gossipy tidbits from a fictional newspaper begin each chapter. I read the deluxe trade paperback, which includes extras such as photographs of the main characters, the deck plan of the ship, and color illustrations of a blue lotus. I enjoyed this book just as much as Murder Among the Pyramids, and look forward to reading about Blix’s adventures in Luxor.

Brenda

Six Weeks by the Sea

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Six Weeks by the Sea by Paula Byrne

In 1801, Jane Austen, her parents, and sister Cassandra moved from the vicarage at Steventon to the city of Bath. Jane was upset at the news, and later at the loss of her piano. At 25, Jane is not yet a published author. She agrees to the move only after her parents promise a seaside holiday every summer.

This novel tells the story of that first summer by the sea, at Sidmouth. Author Paula Byrne, a biographer, wondered if Jane had ever been in love, as she wrote of it so wittily. In Sidmouth, Byrne introduces two suitors and a young biracial girl to the Austen family. Jane uses her connections to help find a foster home for the little girl, and has hopes of a possible romance between her favorite brother, Captain Frank Austen, and Martha Lloyd, the best friend of Jane and sister Cassie.

The holiday is full of seaside walks, dips in the sea, assemblies, a play, and plenty of tea and cocoa. Jane writes whenever she has time, but doesn’t share her work with anyone outside the family except Martha. The reader knows that Jane Austen never marries, so will not expect a traditional happy ever after. Jane Austen is also featured in a mystery series by Stephanie Barron, is which Jane is an amateur sleuth, and has another potential suitor, but it’s set a few years after this novel. The first book in that series is Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor. This was quite an enjoyable read, and is suggested for Anglophiles as well as Janeites.

Brenda

Outlandish

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Outlandish: Walking Europe’s Unlikely Landscapes by Nick Hunt

I enjoyed reading this combination of hiking memoir, geography, nature, history, culture and more. In 2019 Nick, a British travel writer, hikes through arctic tundra to visit two tiny glaciers, in Scotland. Wintry weather makes the hikes quite challenging. But maybe he’ll see the Gray Man, or reindeer.

Next, he travels to Poland and Belarus to walk through parts of the Białowieża rainforest, which is threatened by logging and road building like so many forests, as well as disease. Bison and wolves might be glimpsed here. The border area is quite militarized, yet Nick feels the urge to stray from the paths. Sometimes he camps in a tent during his adventures, other times in motels or guest houses.

In Spain, Nick travels thru the Tabernas desert, made of rock, not sand, during the 2nd hottest summer on record. The desert is near the Mar de Plástico, the Plastic Sea, which is made of polytunnels where more than half of the fruit and vegetables sold in Europe are grown. Many of the workers are migrants from Northern and Saharan Africa who endure sauna-like conditions. In the Spanish desert, many western movies were filmed, and there is still entertainment styled after the wild west. Nick finds the light dazzling, and while having stored several days of water at his camp in a slot canyon, has to remind himself to return each day before running too low on water. Ibex are frequently spotted on the heights of the canyon walls.

The final adventure is on Hungary’s grassland Steppe, almost completely flat, except for ancient burial mounds. He sees native horses, wallowing water buffalo, and miles and miles of grassland. A festival of Europeans and Asians of the grasslands celebrates horses, unusual alcoholic drinks, and even remembrances of Attila the Hun and Genghis Khan.

Vivid writing, great armchair travel writing, and thoughtful explorations of places that are remnants of the past, and how changing climates affect them. A memorable read.

Brenda

The Witch Roads

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The Witch Roads by Kate Elliott

Elen is a deputy courier, delivering messages to small towns and settlements along the same route each month. For part of the month, she’s back home in Orledder Halt, with her teen nephew Kem. Elen can detect and root out new irruptions of Spore. This time Kem is accompanying her on the route, to see if he also wants to be a courier. His Declaration Day is just around the corner. Kem’s mother Aoving died two years ago during an avalanche, while working as a midwife at the Heart Temple. The avalanche has cut Orledder Halt off from travel to the north, except for a secret pathway through the hills and across a canyon.

Two groups of important travelers arrive in Orledder Halt. From one, Kem learns that his father is a lord. The second group includes Prince Gevulin, who’s heading north. Kem, considering being a Warden, joins Prince Gevulin’s group, as does Elen, who knows the hazardous route. Kem is angry with Elen for keeping secrets from him, even after his mother’s death. A guardian statue’s spirit, or haunt, secretly joins the group. Elen has the lowest status of the group and often has to sleep and eat separately from the others. But a simple bed and a full belly remind Elen of the hungry years when Ao and El, orphaned child atoners, were always in danger of the Spore until their daring escape.

This is a memorable journey through an amazing world with many dangers, wonders, and not-quite-human beings. The land is so ancient that much of its history has become myth. Elen and the haunt have some very interesting conversations. I eagerly await Elen and Kem’s further adventures. Epic fantasy readers will likely enjoy this duology, to be concluded this November with The Nameless Roads. The author has two dozen other fantasy works, which I don’t think I’ve read, but look forward to sampling.

Brenda

Murder Takes a Vacation

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Murder Takes a Vacation by Laura Lippman

Widowed Muriel Blossom, 68, has recently won the lottery, bought an apartment in Baltimore, and is on her way to Paris. She has invited her longtime friend Elinor on a cruise to Normandy, and is spending several days in Paris first. Mrs. Blossom (the annoying way Muriel refers to herself) is a large woman who is sensitive to comments about fitness, overeating, or caftans, though she regularly goes for five-mile walks. It’s been ten years since her husband died, but she is planning her trip partly around places and activities he would have liked.

As with many trips, all does not go smoothly. First, she misses her flight from London to Paris, and spends the time talking with attractive and attentive Allan, who even convinces the claustrophobic Mrs. Blossom to take the train through the underground Chunnel instead of rebooking her flight to Paris. Her hotel room in Paris is searched, as is her cabin on the riverboat, but she doesn’t report it to anyone. Allan mysteriously disappears, as does another acquaintance. And then there’s charming Danny, who takes Mrs. Blossom shopping, and even talks her into buying a caftan. Danny seems to turn up rather too often. Could there be a connection with the room searches and a missing statue with sapphire eyes?

I was really looking forward to reading a mystery set in gorgeous Paris and on a wonderful riverboat cruise in France, but I didn’t feel immersed in the setting. There was more about shopping and accessories than there was about the cruise experience. I was also surprised that a woman who had worked for a private investigator and has been single for ten years would let strangers and acquaintances have so much influence on her. Mrs. Blossom spends more time missing her daughter and granddaughters, who recently moved to Tokyo, than about solving the mystery. That said, this was a fun adventure, with good food, a bit of French scenery, and a little suspense and mystery. Mrs. Blossom does stand up for herself and her friend Elinor before the end of the cruise, and an epilogue shows her enjoying her new life in Baltimore.

This is a quick, easy read, perfect for the beach.

Brenda  

Wild Chocolate

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Wild Chocolate: Across the Americas In Search of Cacao’s Soul by Rowan Jacobsen

This is a fascinating combination of history, travel, agriculture, and chocolate. Traveling as part of a team with the Heirloom Cacao Preservation Fund, Rowan travels to southern Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Brazil, and Bolivia in search of the best cacao varieties and beans and to meet the farmers and the people working to get their beans from farm to factory to table. There are varieties of cacao beans most of us have never heard of or tasted, such as Criollo.

Rowan makes many journeys by bus and down creeks and rivers, sleeping in hammocks, getting bitten by ants, mosquitoes, and gnats.  He learns about challenges of collecting freshly harvested cacao pods and along with farmers, how to dry, sort and ferment cacao beans, and then getting them shipped to a city or another country to be made into an amazing variety of chocolate bars.

Bean to bar chocolate is more expensive than the mass-produced chocolate, and Rowan explains why, and where to purchase it online, or in a few cities. I haven’t ordered any yet, but did find a single origin bar to try at a local store (not the same as true bean to bar or wild chocolate) and found it to be very complex and tasting of raisins. I didn’t love it, but look forward to trying new varieties of gourmet chocolate.

The author has also written about apples, oysters, truffles, and honey bees in crisis, among other topics.

Brenda

How to Winter

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How to Winter: Harness Your Mindset to Thrive on Cold, Dark, or Difficult Days by Kari Leibowitz, PhD

I finished reading this book the first week of January, during our coldest stretch of winter so far. I’ve tried to get outside for more seasonal activities this winter, as I wasn’t looking forward to the dark and cold. We’ve had a few snows, but not enough to shovel, or to sled, snowshoe, or cross-country ski. The author grew up in New Jersey, then went south to Atlanta for college, where she studied psychology.

Wanting to study winter mindsets, she headed to the University of Tromso, in northern Norway, where winter is embraced, even during the long polar night. She has since spent time in winter in Finland, Amsterdam, Iceland, the Hebrides off the northwest coast of Scotland, Yamagata, Japan, and Edmonton, in Alberta, Canada. Being active outdoors in winter is covered, as is being cozy indoors, exemplified by the Scandinavian concept of hygge. She learned that a positive winter mindset can help, along with the right clothing and footwear, local winter-themed activities and festivals to attend, but also infrastructure such as heated sidewalks, lighted ski trails, plowed bike lanes and streets. For coziness, candles, fires, heated patios with blankets, saunas, hot baths, and for outdoors, even winter swimming. The author also discusses climate change and how that’s affecting cities and regions that embrace winter. I live in the Midwest and observed less snow overall and fewer days for activities like sledding and snowshoeing. If you don’t live in a snowy area, the author encourages winter tourism, which is promoted by the Twin Cities in Minnesota and in Edmonton, Alberta.

This is an engaging, worthwhile read. I don’t know if it’s changed my winter mindset, but I have been appreciating winter skies and scenery more, and find that going for a walk on a chilly day can be invigorating and pleasant, but am still avoiding outdoor activities on very cold days or nights. I did learn that sandhill cranes are still migrating south in early January; perhaps I haven’t been outside enough in past years to hear their distinctive calls. I have also enjoyed more evenings with a group of LED candles adding ambience, even while doing a little garden planning for spring.

Brenda

We Solve Murders

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We Solve Murders by Richard Osman

Sometimes I need a fun crime thriller or caper for escapist reading. This first book in a new series by Osman is just the ticket. While different from his Thursday Murder Club mysteries, fans of one series may enjoy the other. To begin with, Amy Wheeler and her father-in-law Steve are the good guys. Steve is a widowed ex-cop with a cat named Trouble. He lives in the English town of Axley where he walks to a favorite park bench every day to talk with Debbie, his late wife. Then there is lunch at the pub, where Tony can diagnose the problems with his car’s clutch, and quiz night once a week. He has just located a missing dog. There are frequent texts and regular chats with Amy, a bodyguard, and less frequent texts with his son Adam, currently en route to Dubai.

Amy is guarding longtime bestselling writer Rosie D’Antonio on her private island off the coast of South Carolina. Recently, three couriers have died, all with ties to Maximum Impact, the security company owned by Jeff, Amy’s boss, and to a small public relations firm in England. One of the deaths happened off the coast of South Carolina, and Amy learns that she’s a suspect. When she’s not sure who to trust, she asks Steve for help. At first reluctant to travel, Steve finds that he enjoys private plane rides, and the action moves to St. Lucia, Dublin, Dubai, and the New Forest in England. Pubs, posh restaurants, airports, golf courses and spas are all featured here. Steve and Amy make connections, ask questions, are occasionally in danger, and along with Rosie, are vastly entertaining. A movie actor, another security guard, and a caddy all help them figure out who’s responsible for the crime wave. Adam also gets to help, but is a minor character here. In the end, loose ends are tied up and the reader finally emerges back into the real world, refreshed.

Steve and Amy decide they will work together to solve mysteries, and Rosie may have located a missing cat. The Marseille Caper and The Corsican Caper by Peter Mayle are readalikes.

Brenda