4 out of 5 stars
As regular readers of my reviews will know I have read a lot of travel books and have even been fortunate enough to be a judge on two of the prizes on the Stanford Travel writing awards. Of all of the books that I have read, I have had a number that I thought were outstanding, for example, An Unexpected Light, To A Mountain in Tibet and The Bells of Old Tokyo.
Each person reads a book differently, and in Scraps of Wool, Bill Colegrave has collected here some of his all-time favourite passages from the vast quantities of travel books that he has read. He hasn’t done this alone either, he has minded the minds and bookshelves of the greatest travel writers such as Dervla Murphy, Jan Morris and Sara Wheeler to name a few.
It is an eclectic and very personal collection and that is its strength. Some of the passages come from my favourite books and they are not the passages that I would have selected, which for me goes to show that each and every person gets something different from each book.
If you like travel writing then this is a great book to be able to dip into old favourites and discover books that you have not yet read. I have made a list and will slowly work my way through all the others that I haven’t read.
Sounds great but also dangerous for the wish list … !
It was. I have the list of books in a spreadsheet now if you need me to send it to you
Best not, for the time being! Might send me over the edge!! But thank you.