Travel Writing

Right. So what could be better than this book? Maybe one of the 100 vacations profiled here. Beach-goers beware, this creative book is about showing people, dare I say, more interesting alternatives to the typical vacation. Ready to try mountain biking? Yoga instruction? Want to study French—in a Maine village? Here's your opportunity. Make a film in New York. Weave a Navajo rug. Learn to surf in Mexico. Pam Grout aims to make sure your next vacation won't just be time off, but time well spent. So get out there and get to know yourself a little better. And send us here at Bookshop Santa Cruz a postcard! —R.M.

This beautifully written, heartfelt memoir touched a nerve among both readers and reviewers. Elizabeth Gilbert tells how she made the difficult choice to leave behind all the trappings of modern American success (marriage, house in the country, career) and find, instead, what she truly wanted from life. Setting out for a year to study three different aspects of her nature amid three different cultures, Gilbert explored the art of pleasure in Italy and the art of devotion in India, and then a balance between the two on the Indonesian island of Bali. By turns rapturous and rueful, this wise and funny author (whom "Booklist" calls "Anne Lamott's hip, yoga- practicing, footloose younger sister") is poised to garner yet more adoring fans. -L

Non-fiction does not get any better than this. Junger's relationship to the sea is fascinating, while his account of the storm is both thrilling and terrifying. This is a must read.—RC

There have been many books and screeds of late dissecting the nature of the "American Character" and its relationship with the world at large, but I must inform the authors of said tracts that this was best accomplished over a century ago by none other than the great exemplar of the best of American character, Mark Twain. As the world's foolishness is impaled on Twain's lance of logic and wit, one finds that our modern foolishness is not so greatly improved from that of the past. —JAC