Since publishing the original edition of A Woman’s World in 1995, Travelers’ Tales has been the recognized leader in women’s travel literature. The Best Women’s Travel Writing 2010 is the sixth book in an annual series that presents stimulating, inspiring, and uplifting adventures from women who have traveled to the ends of the earth to discover new places, peoples, and facets of themselves. The common threads connecting these stories are a woman’s perspective and fresh, compelling storytelling to make the reader laugh, weep, wish she were there, or be glad she wasn’t. In The Best Women's Travel Writing 2010 readers will discover the hidden magic of Flamenco in Spain, walk the night and its terrors in Benin, have an excellent last day in Costa Rica, poke their way into the psyche of a security agent in Kabul, learn something new about death and Mexico in San Miguel de Allende, travel the darker side of the Hawaiian fantasy, draw a map of Argentinian tango, meet the best people in the world in Zimbabwe...and much more. With contributions from Mary Caperton Morton, Colette O’Connor, Alison Stein Wellner, Jennifer Percy, Johanna Gohmann, Landon Spencer, Beebe Bahrami, Laura Katers, Jennifer De Leon, Erika Connor, Marcy Gordon, Megan Lyles, Valerie Conners, Shauna Sweeney, Maliha Masood, Christine Buckley, Deborah Milstein, Sara Bathum, Heather Poole, Liz Sinclair, Diane LeBow, A. Kendra Greene, Diane Caldwell, Kellen Zale, Laurie Weed, Elisabeth Eaves, Marisa Handler.
Stephanie Elizondo Griest is author of the award-winning memoirs Around the Bloc and Mexican Enough. Assistant professor of creative nonfiction at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, she has lectured across the world, including as U.S. State Department literary ambassador to Venezuela in 2015, and has been a Henry Luce Scholar in China, Hodder Fellow at Princeton, and winner of the Margolis Award for Social Justice Reporting.
27 travel essays by mostly American women traveling the world, each around 10 pages long and almost all first published in this collection. Given the short length of the stories, this is a good choice for readers who have a short attention span, minimal reading time, or who, like me, are juggling multiple books. I love travel narratives, and have managed to collect several of the books in this annual series that was published from 2005 - 2016. In trying to find space on my shelves, I realized I hadn’t actually read any of them (I can shop much faster than I can read). Ultimately, I found this was worth reading but not strong enough to keep.
Overall, the stories are a mix, but I found almost all worthwhile. There were a few that in striving to be literary, tend to feel disjointed and hard to follow. They start in the middle of an experience without establishing where they take place (including the location in the header of each tale would have been helpful) and make references to people without having explained who they are. A few are too internally focused, jumping from feeling to feeling while neglecting to effectively capture the place (which is what the reader of a travel tale is most interested in). One was so focused on the man that got away, it became more memoir than a travel narrative, and could have almost as easily been in Maine as it’s Russian setting.
But in any varied collection, there will be hits and misses for each reader, and some readers may enjoy those tales more than I did. It is a varied collection, and includes experiences from all over the world.
Here are the essays that stood out to me:
“The Suffer Fest” by Mary Caperton Morton (Ecuador) - does a good job of describing what mountain climbing is like. Or so I assume, I’d never do it. That’s what books are for.
“The Heat Seeker” by Alison Stein Wellner (Germany, India & Honduras) - I enjoyed both Wellner’s descriptions of experiencing spicy food as well as how she weaves in some relevant history and science. I love when an author both entertains and educates.
“The Angel of Repose” by Marcy Gordon (Italy) - Gordon’s story of staying with a host family in Italy with two young boys made me laugh out loud, which doesn’t happen often. I just wish it was longer.
“Siliguri” by Megan Lyles (India) - an arresting account of what it’s like to travel in India solo as a foreign woman. The men constantly harass and proposition her, and no one steps in to help. There was a moment where the fear was palpable.
“White Lady Scrubbing” by Sara Bathum (Ethiopia) - I found Bathum’s account of volunteer work in a small town in the Great Rift Valley near the Kenyan border interesting and engaging as she focuses on how the children treated her, always crowding around and wanting to hold her hands and touch her. It reminded me of the week I spent volunteering in Lima, Peru during college, and the children who lived at the place we were staying (like in Bathum’s account, they had parents who couldn’t care for them).
“Desert Queen” by Diana Caldwell (Jordan) - a sometimes tense account of the author’s experience when she agreed to a romantic trip with a handsome and poetic man she meets in the desert who turns out to be far from the man of her dreams. It reads like a romance novel gone horribly, and realistically, wrong.
“Madonna and Mr.Hu” by Kellen Zale (China) - Zale’s account reads almost like fiction as she describes a weekend spent with a Communist leader in China whose entire English vocabulary consists of Madonna lyrics. He is constantly trying to get her together with her pompous male colleague, a fellow teacher. At times humorous, Zale also captures the difficulties and stress of living in another culture, particularly one that sees women as secondary.
This is the first time I have read this genre of books and I enjoyed it immensely. It takes a minute to get used to this style of story telling by different authors. Some stories are more enjoyable than the others. But each of them is full of adventure and courage. I admire these women for seeking out these experiences most of which we are likely never to experience. It was fascinating to learn that travel is not just about taking a vacation or for work but also about personal conquests like summiting the volcano or teaching English in a small African village or volunteering at a dog shelter in India. I enjoyed learning about Burma, something I never knew about. I would highly recommend this genre of books to everyone.
I found these pieces to be of uneven quality. Some of them did not ring true, making me wonder whether the tale was made up or greatly exaggerated. In winter in Maine (and particularly in this pandemic year) I like to read travel books and daydream about going to exotic places.
I recently picked up the 2010 edition of The Best Women’s Travel Writing, a work that comes out yearly. It had come to my attention due to there being contributions from three authors who are currently in Iowa City: Kendra Greene, Marisa Handler and Jennifer Percy. It’s also edited by another Iowa City author, Stephanie Elizondo Griest, who’s works have been in other travel compilations.
While I enjoyed reading it, I have to admit that it was a little hit-and-miss for me. The idea of ‘travel’ can be a broad one, and it is here; many of the selections centered on women who were in long-term situations in other places, such as teaching English in China, or on particular activities in another locale, such as mountain climbing in Central America. Very few pieces were about the actual act of travel, of trains and planes, of going from one place to another, of vacationing, and so on. They were more about becoming enmeshed in another place and culture, of what takes you somewhere, what happens there, and how those places change you. The topics were widely varied, and each interesting for their uniqueness and personal nature. Frankly, even if the topic or location wasn’t one that I was entirely interested in, each piece was short enough that I would finish reading it, and usually ended up enjoying it more than I thought I would. There were even a couple that I found to be particularly poignant and thought-provoking, when I hadn’t really expected it. Overall, a pleasant read with some incisive writing, sure to please whether you’re reading it while making your own travels, or doing a little armchair travel. --Candice
I liked some of these essays and really didn't like others, but mostly I was a little annoyed at the very short length of all the pieces (I imagine there was some kind of maximum length allowed for submissions), which prevented me from fully investing in many of the storytellers and their experiences, even though it did make the book very easy to read and good for the beach or a plane (perhaps the primary objective). I'm not very familiar with travel writing as a genre, so I can't say whether this seemed a worthy "best of," but I was not impressed by the quality of writing overall and the collection felt a little too self-consciously "woman-y" to me, with lots of "female issues" pieces and "rah rah - go women!!" sentiment. Not that I'm against those things, but more subtlety and skill in handling them would have been appreciated.
Editor Stephanie Griest made some fabulous choices with a variety of attitudes from travelers from mostly America traveling to equally different locations. These women all have much in common with Cheryl Strayed of "Wild" fame and her "Tiny Beautiful Things". Our eyes and ethics are opened wide when we move into the wider circle of our space!
Each is different. There are a variety of adventures with food, cooking, friendships, religions, and needless to say, "something for everyone"! These little short stories make an ideal escape from books of more serious contemplation, meditation etc. My favorite was a bedtime read!
Looking forward to finishing two additional compilations written by one author each. A marvelous insight into the mindset of different writers.
All I can say is I loved this book and I hope I get to write something for it someday. I see much of myself in these women, although I know traveling isn't something I'm going to do full-time for much longer (yes, I consider living in Singapore as 'traveling'). The stories really captured what for me is a passion: going new places, learning new things, seeing the beauty of the world.
The women who write these stories are extremely daring - like they climb mountains in the dark so they won't sink into the softer, daytime snow, while roped to other climbers!
I may not get a lot of practical travel tips, but I am hoping for some vicarious
adventure!
Still reading this incredible collection. Very hardy women - I don't think I measure up!
Short stories can be so satisfying. An author can paint a scene with complex characters in a relatively short time. Such talent! I did not approve of each author's values (leaving loved ones on a whim, putting themselves in potentially dangerous situations) but I was amazed and excited by their courage.
A really pretty decent collection of stories from female travelers. Some of the stories were a lot higher quality than others, and several of the writers seemed to have little grasp of the cultures they were writing about experiencing, but overall most of them were quite good.
Uneven writing - a lot of the stories tend towards the Anna Leonowens oh-aren't-these-exotic-people-so-quaint! end of experience - but when these women get it right, they really, really do. Fun and a quick read.
Great travel tales from all over the world. They have stirred my wonderlust and I am thinking more and more about South America and Africa, places I have never been.
Some of the essays were a lot better than others. I felt like too many of them were "I was a backpacker travelling around and staying with a host family" themed.