4 out of 5 stars
The publisher provided a copy of this, free of charge, in return for an honest review.
It felt like her life was unravelling. Coffey had split with her boyfriends, her father had just been diagnosed with cancer and she had decided to quit her job. All this just as the pandemic started. IT was this large amount of free time and the discovery of a translation of the Odyssey by Emily Wilson that opened her eyes to the story and gave her the inkling of an idea.
The urge to travel burned inside her. But this was the time of lockdowns, no international travel and only being allowed out from home to shop and for an hours exercise. It wasn’t going to get to the Mediterranean any time soon…
Later in 202 as the initial wave of infections dropped, the opportunity to travel opened up again. She spoke to her father about her plans and he encouraged her to go. She was finally off to get some sun.
She arrived in Sicily but wasn’t intending to stay there for long. Rather this was to be a six-month journey around the region visiting and staying on the tiny islands that were thought to be the locations mentioned in the Odyssey, the Aeolian Sea, the Adriatic coast and the Balearic islands.
She had managed to secure some freelance work and this as going to give her some security and finance some of the travel costs. It would also give her the means to indulge in the new life she is creating for herself. She swims daily in the cold Mediterranean (it probably isn’t as cold as the North Sea!), enjoying her morning espresso and making the most of her life there.
It gives her time to reflect on what went wrong with her relationship and she speaks regularly to her father as he undergoes treatment. They have always got on well, though it could be strained at times. But the medical care he is getting is not working well and he is not improving. Coffey will have to make a decision on whether she needs to head home to see him and if she will be allowed as international travel is shut down again.
I did like this book a lot, but elements of it made for hard reading. The emotive account of her father’s battle with cancer was particularly tough to read and brought back memories of my experiences. That said the travelogue elements of the book were really good. Coffey has a way of writing that is quite evocative, she captures the moment really well and it made me want to be sitting in the same café enjoying a morning coffee and watching the sea sparkle. The link between the travelling and the Odyssey as she traced the islands was done well too.
So would I recommend this? Yes. It made me want to visit these places and discover them for myself and that I think, is the primary aim of a travel book.
I think I’d find this a hard read, too – not going through the same thing but difficult family times. But what a beautiful cover.
It would be hard for some people to like given her fathers illness and the way that she writes about it. I only had a proof so haven’t seen the full cover, but it is beautiful