Product Description

The author who unforgettably captured the experience of starting a new life in Tuscany in bestselling travel memoirs expands her horizons to immerse herself—and her readers—in the sights, aromas, and treasures of twelve new special places.

A Year in the World is vintage Frances Mayes—a celebration of the allure of travel, of serendipitous pleasures found in unlikely locales, of memory woven into the present, and of a joyous sense of quest. An ideal travel companion, Frances Mayes brings to the page the curiosity of an intrepid explorer, remarkable insights into the wonder of the everyday, and a compelling narrative style that entertains as it informs.

With her beloved Tuscany as a home base, Mayes travels to Spain, Portugal, France, the British Isles, and to the Mediterranean world of Turkey, Greece, the South of Italy, and North Africa. In Andalucía, she relishes the intersection of cultures. She cooks in Portugal, gathers ideas in the gardens of England and Scotland, takes a literary pilgrimage to Burgundy, discovers an ideal place to live in Mantova, and explores the essential Moroccan city of Fez. She rents houses among ordinary residents, shops at neighborhood markets, wanders the back streets, and everywhere contemplates the concept of home. While in Greece, she follows the classic Homeric voyage across the Aegean, lives in a bougainvillea-draped stone house in Crete, and then drives deep into the Mani. In Turkey with friends, she sails the ancient coast, hiking to archaeological sites and snorkeling over sunken Byzantine towns. Weaving together personal perceptions and informed commentary on art, architecture, history, landscape, and social and culinary traditions of each area, Mayes brings the immediacy of life in her temporary homes to the reader. An illuminating and passionate book that will be savored by all who loved Under the Tuscan Sun, A Year in the World is travel writing at its peak.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1004235 in Books
• Published on: 2006-03-14
• Released on: 2006-03-14
• Format: Large Print
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 736 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Even people who don't normally read travel books are aware of the old Italian villa that Mayes and her husband restored, chronicled in Mayes's bestseller Under the Tuscan Sun and three other books about Tuscany. So it's somewhat surprising when Mayes declares her wanderlust, her passion for other beautiful places in the world. She adores Tuscany, but also loves tasting other people's cuisines, learning their gardening habits, reading their poetry, swimming their waters. She's always looking around and wondering, "How do place and character intertwine? Could I feel at home here? What is home to those around me? Who are they in their homes, those mysterious others?" In this luminous volume, she and her husband visit southern Spain, Portugal, Sicily, southern Italy, Morocco, Greece, Crete, Scotland, Turkey and places in between. Usually they rent an apartment or villa, so they can cook, sprawl and feel like "locals." They survive a couple of package trips (a cruise around the Greek islands, a small charter around Turkey) which only highlight the pleasures of independent travel—having the freedom to wander and discover things for themselves, without a schedule. And happily, there's no mention of prices to mar readers' escapist fantasies. (Mar. 14)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From AudioFile
Frances Mayes endeavors to make the listener feel as much at home around the world as she made them feel in Tuscany with her first bestseller, UNDER THE TUSCAN SUN. She transports the listener to houses and apartments in Morocco, England, Italy, Spain, Turkey, and Portugal, with some side trips to other parts of her adopted Italy and a cruise to Greece. The trips were taken over a five-year span and include the details expected of Mayes--history, shopping, scenery, and, most importantly, food. However, Mayes's monotone reading lacks the enthusiasm one would expect and shines only when describing the people in her life. Still, the abridgment is well done, making her occasional detailed ramblings about history or descriptions much more bearable. H.L.S. © AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

From Booklist
What Mayes accomplished in her popularization of Tuscany she now extends to a larger stage. Despite the title's claim, she does not reach everywhere on this orb, but she and her husband do manage a slow, deliberate itinerary taking them across much of Western Europe with a brief touchdown in Africa. Commencing with an excursion to Madrid in January, Mayes tours Spain down through Andalusia and the Costa del Sol. Portugal follows. By May, she returns to Italy, not to her beloved Tuscany, but first to Naples and then to Sicily. The couple spends time in Burgundy and Scotland before hopping back to Aegean lands. Wherever she goes, Mayes reflects at length on the cultural, historical, and literary highlights of the lands and peoples she visits. Mayes' touchstone in every locale is the region's cuisine. Her brief inventory of Portuguese soups alone could inspire a reexamination of that nation's cookery. Naples' pizza and cheese, Sicily's seafood, Crete's lamb, and Scotland's shortbread receive Mayes' encomiums. From time to time, Mayes even offers some recipes. Befitting her gifts as a poet, Mayes' prose shines with evocative imagery, bringing life to every subject she encounters across her peripatetic year. Mark Knoblauch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Customer Reviews

I tried but this is brutal
The problem with this is I found her husband's comments far more interesting when she quoted him. Basically, the wrong person wrote this book. I gave up halfway through the second country (Portugal after Spain) she visited as the writing bored me beyond belief. It just seemed that she made no effort to meet interesting people. She also seemed to have swallowed a dictionary which is a killer for me as it just makes the writer sound pretentious. Shame this travel book blows as the places the writer visits are ones I'm totally interested in.

Mayes' misses
This book is not as charming as her previous output. Mayes' is too much in evidence and complains too much. For a traveller, she doesn't seem to do her research. Why else would she end up in so many lodgings that are shabby, dark or generally not up to spec? The tone of the book is not upbeat. She worries that she and Ed won't be able to afford to live without their jobs - which they decide to leave as she explains in the preface. This from an author who has sold so many books and movie rights! In addition, Mayes spends much of her time describing the places she visits in a moanng way - where are the quaint settings she longs for? The world moves on but Mayes seems to wish that the imagined way of life from the past should be available to her. One questions why 'the rest of the world' should remain static so she can enjoy it. Finally, she commits an egregious error by placing Wales in England. How did the editor miss that mistake?