nomadreader

narrated by Debra Winger The basics:  "Gloria Steinem had an itinerant childhood. When she was a young girl, her father would pack the family in the car every fall and drive across country searching for adventure and trying to make a living. The seeds were planted: Gloria realized that growing up didn’t have to mean settling down. And so began a lifetime of travel, of activism and leadership, of listening to people whose voices and ideas would inspire change and revolution."--publisher My thoughts: I've been fascinated by Gloria Steinem for a long time, as she was one of those public figures I just always seemed to know about. Yet I remember when I discovered she was born in 1934 and couldn't believe it. Not only did she seem younger, but it made her achievements that much more impressive; she was that much more ahead of her time. For someone I feel like I know so well, for the sheer number of years she's spent in the spotlight, when I heard about this mem...

The backstory: Lucy Knisley is perhaps my favorite graphic memoirist. I've previously read and enjoyed French Milk , Relish , and An Age of License . The basics: Displacement  is a travel memoir of Knisley's experience on a cruise ship with her ailing grandparents (who are over 90 years old.) She also intersperses entries from her grandfather's old army journal, which she read on the cruise. My thoughts: I have never been on a cruise. Part of me wants to go, but another part of me remembers I don't like crowds. And while I love the water, I am also claustrophobic. Would being on a boat I can't leave feel free or confining? Even before reading Displacement , I'm certain I would not want to be the sole caregiver for two people over 90 while on a cruise. The set-up of this memoir sounds like a quirky independent comedy, and I was curious to see how Lucy and her grands, as she calls them, fared. One of the things I love about Knisley's graphic memoirs is...

The basics: Halfway Home  is a graphic journal of Christine Mari Inzer's trip to Japan, the country where she was born. My thoughts:  I'm a huge fan of travel writing, so I was eager to read Halfway Home , the debut from Christine Mari Inzer, a teenage graphic memoirist. Inzer was born in Tokyo in 1997. Her family moved to the U.S. in 2003. In the summer she turned sixteen, she returned to Japan by herself to visit family and explore her roots. Halfway Home  transported me to Japan along with Inzer. It made me feel sixteen again, in the sense that she captures the good and the bad parts of being that age. Inzer's trip to Japan is unique, in that she is exploring both by herself and with family. As she explores alone, however, she also has advice from her father about where to go and what to see. Like so many travel journals, food is a big part of Halfway Home , and I quite enjoyed Inzer's depictions and descriptions of her meals. As I read her travel journal, I ...

The backstory: Lucy Knisley is perhaps my favorite graphic memoirist. I've thoroughly enjoyed her first two graphic memoirs: French Milk  and Relish . The basics: In An Age of License, Knisley recounts her European book tour. My thoughts: An Age of License  is somewhat reminiscent of French Milk , as it's a travelogue and takes the form of her travel diary. While food is a frequent theme in this graphic memoir, as it is always is in Knisley's work, the emphasis here is more on life and reality. Even as Knisley enjoys her trek across Europe, there's a seriousness, and even a darkness, to this memoir. Knisley's most recent long-term relationship recently ended. She still loves him, but she wants kids (one day), and he doesn't. As someone who didn't want kids for many years, and then was ambivalent about having kids for many more, I fully appreciate this tension. Disagreement about children trumps love. As Knisley rebounds from the end of this relationshi...

Happy Sunday morning from my beloved porch couch! Our three-season porch is my favorite part of our house, and I expected to be able to use it all winter, but it turned out to be far too cold for that. We've just opened it back up, and I love having its extra space, particularly as we very slowly drift toward spring (yes, it's supposed to snow tomorrow, but then we should see a 68-degree-high later in the week.) Travel The great second trimester travel tour came to an end when we got back from New York yesterday afternoon. For the past five weeks, I've spent more time away from home than at home. It's been such a joy to visit all of the other cities I've called home in my adult life (Atlanta, Lawrence, Kansas City, and Albany) and have my baby bump rubbed and kissed and loved by so many. Our baby already has quite the village cheering its arrival in August. As much fun as my trips have been, it's also really good to be home. I'm starting to feel that nest...

Happy Sunday! Lately, another Sunday means another city. Today I'm writing from the Orlando airport (cheers to free wifi, Orlando!) I'm heading back home this morning, where the temperatures promise to be below zero when I arrive. As much as I love winter, negative temperatures are too cold even for me. At least my sunburn will help keep me warm! I've been in Orlando since Tuesday. I spent two days at the Information Fluency Conference , where I presented on using documentary films as vehicles to teach information literacy, media literacy and visual literacy. It was a great conference, and when it ended I went to the other side of Orlando to meet up with my three best friends from high school (one of whom lives here), including two six-month old babies. We had a delightfully relaxing few days. I'm having a hard time grasping that our trip next February or March, I'll be the one with the six-month old. As much as I love traveling, I am greatly relieved and excite...

It's another Sunday, and I'm in another city I still call home. The great second trimester travel tour is cruising along, and visiting places I used to love has me marveling at what paths our baby's life will take. Traveling I drove down to Lawrence yesterday afternoon to go to the Kansas-Texas basketball game. It was my first game at Allen Fieldhouse in ten years, and it was a great one! Our seats were incredible . My father and I sat nine rows back from the court, behind the Texas bench, and next to all of the Kansas players' families. It's always a special time at Allen Fieldhouse, but last night was extra special, and I'm so glad I could share it with my father. Baby D-L's in utero experience was definitely unlike anything s/he has experienced so far. As much as I love Lawrence, I'm glad this trip is such a short one because I only got back from Atlanta a few days ago and leave for Orlando Tuesday. In this whirlwind of traveling, I miss Mr. No...

I was fourteen when I first saw Before Sunrise . I'm pretty sure I saw it more than once in the theater, but I definitely remember it's one of the few films I've owned on VHS, Laserdisc (my family were early adopters), and dvd. It's a film I've loved for years. It's a film I still know most of the lines and facial expressions, even though I had not seen it in at least two years. Yet when I sat down to watch it with my husband Friday night, I was amazed to discover the film resonates more with me now than it ever has. Let me back up. In case you're unfamiliar with this film, it's the story of Jesse, an American, and Celine, a Frenchwoman, who meet on a train. Jesse is heading to Vienna, where he flies out the next morning. Celine is returning to Paris after visiting her grandmother in Hungary. Jesse convinces Celine to get off the train with him in Vienna, and they explore the city and talk all night. This description will likely either make you want to...

Hello, faithful readers! I had the best of intentions of writing this post yesterday, but I simply didn't get around to it. That seems to be the theme around here, right? Both my reading and blogging have taken a hit lately. I generally enjoy what I'm reading, but I'm averaging closer to one book a week than my usually two to three. When I make the time to read, I enjoy myself. What I've been struggling with is making the time to read. I'm finding myself particularly stressed out with work this fall and unable to stop thinking about work when I'm not there. Despite my love for the fall weather and upcoming holidays, I'm almost wishing for summer, when my work-life balance was in great shape. I'm determined to find my way back to a good work-life balance. The upside is that I do love my job, but I miss having more time to do the things I love outside of work! Read-a-thon The read-a-thon was mostly a bust for me. I did enjoy reading posts and particip...

The basics: This passage from the introduction sums it up beautifully: "I'd woken up at the age of thirty-four to realize that I wanted to go home, only to discover that I had no idea where that was. Wanderlust, the very strong or irresistible impulse to travel, is adopted untouched from the German, presumably because it couldn't be improved upon." My thoughts: Wanderlust  started strong for me. The introduction was intriguing. A thirty-four-year-old with no sense of home? With a few different life decision, I could have easily become that. (I'm thankful to now believe I have many homes rather than none, but it took me some time to feel that way.) I was eager to see Elisabeth's journey from the beginning. The action begins when she's a teenager in suburban Vancouver feeling restless. It was fascinating to see travel form her eyes. I had the travel bug early too, but I yearned for Europe, Australia, and big cities. I wanted the to find the universality ...

The backstory: Entertainment Weekly  named How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less  as one of the 10 Best Graphic Novels of 2010 . The basics: Sarah Glidden goes on a birthright trip to Israel with trepidation because of Israeli policies. Is it all propaganda or will it be a great experience? My thoughts: For some reason, I have been having an incredibly difficult time reviewing this lovely graphic memoir. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. It was a fascinating look into the birthright trip experience, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and young adulthood. Sarah Glidden is refreshingly honest about her struggles with Israel and Palestine. She wants there to be a right answer, and she hopes to find it through her thorough pre-trip research and open eyes throughout her trip. The verdict:  I shared in Glidden's frustrations at the complexity of life. Her trip is emotional in so many ways, and I truly felt I experienced it with her, through both her watercolor art...

The basics: The sub-title of Radio Shangri-La  could easily be 'What I Learned About  Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth.' Lisa Napoli's fascinating memoir takes her from a chance encounter at a Manhattan dinner party to Bhutan, where she uses her career in radio to assist Bhutan's new (and only) radio station. My thoughts:  I confess, before I read Radio Shangri-La , I could find Bhutan on a map, but I knew next to nothing about its people, history, and customs. Ultimately, I would call it a travel memoir, and I learned as much about Bhutan as I did about Lisa. Lisa is quite candid about her own happiness, both personally and professionally. Originally from New York, she's in her early 40's and working for public radio in Los Angeles. Lisa's fascination with Bhutan is partly universal but partly intensely personal. Internet and television are recent additions to Bhutan, and Lisa appreciated a certain simplicity of life. The changes in Bhutan are a to...

The basics: French Milk  is the story of the month Lucy and her mother spent in Paris celebrating their 22nd and 50th birthdays, respectively. Lucy is an aspiring cartoonist, and she publishes her diary, which is essentially a graphic memoir. My thoughts: I knew French Milk  was a memoir when I started reading it, but I didn't realize it was in diary form. Perhaps some changes were made between its original writing and its subsequent publication, but there is a beautiful, raw honesty present that makes me think it is authentic. In many ways, Lucy is a typical 22-year-old. She misses her boyfriend. She gets homesick. She gets her period and gets really cranky. It's not an idyllic portrait of a vacation, and I love it even more for that. Knisley doesn't sugarcoat the parts of travel that are unfortunate. Part of my enjoyment of this book is incredibly personal. I spent a month in 2004 (the year Lucy and her mother went to Paris) in France, Italy and Greece. It was one of...

Originally, I intended to post my Favorite Books of 2009 today, but then I looked at the pile of books I have set aside for this week of train travel and vacation: The Graveyard Book, The Help, Wolf Hall, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Road, Gilead , and I thought making such a list would be premature. (I'll post my true Favorite Books of 2009 on January 1.) Facing twenty-four hours of train riding (each way), I put far too much thought into what books to take, as I always do. Truthfully, the pile will probably change a few more times. Thank you to the friends and book bloggers who offered recommendations. Whether I take the time to always comment or not, I so enjoy reading book blogs. This week I'll be mostly offline, but I'll still post a few reviews, glance at my email, and read a few of my favorite book blogs. Everything else will be there after Christmas. Happy Holidays and Happy Reading!

How did I miss Friday's New York Times travel article about Kansas ? The dear Flint Hills get the star treatment, and with the exception of the kind words for Wichita, the article nails the simple beauty of the prairie.

It's a theme park inspired by the works of Charles Dickens. The Boston Globe begins, "In Dickens World, rat catchers hunt vermin on London's cobbled streets, pickpockets roam the alleys -- and visitors line up for a fun- tastic water ride." The full article. I do hope this delightful attraction makes the itinerary for next year's trip to England.