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Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe
by Bill Bryson
A humorous account of Bill Bryson's travels through Europe.
Bill Bryson’s Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe chronicles Bryson’s backpacking trip across Europe as he attempts to recreate the journey that he made twenty years earlier.
Leaving behind his family and job in late December, Bryson begins his life-changing journey, traveling from Norway to Istanbul and everywhere in between. Twenty years earlier, Bryson traveled to these same spots with his high school friend, Stephen Katz, mixing visits to cultural and historical attractions with tales of women and European nightlife. Now, traveling alone, Bryson faces a very different experience as he retraces his steps, yet finds the same fulfillment and magic in his journey. His humorous accounts of both the people and sites in some of Europe’s most popular destinations provide the story’s greatest entertainment, as Bryson honestly expresses the same viewpoints and frustrations that some Americans visiting Europe know very well.
It is this humor that propels the story forward and draws readers in. Bryson’s experiences, and especially his recounting of his travels with Stephen Katz many years earlier, result in laugh-out-loud moments for the novel’s readers. The story is an account of Bryson’s trip, and therefore has no formal plotline. Because of this, the story occasionally seems bogged down by historical narration and details about the countries that he is visiting, but Bryson’s lighthearted take on travel is able to hold the reader’s attention. When the story draws to a close, it is clear that Bryson’s European excursion is both a rewarding and satisfying experience—but, as the saying goes, there is no place like home.
Title: Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe
Author: Bill Bryson
Publisher: Harper Perennial
ISBN: 0380713802
Review written by: Meghan Moynihan
Reviewer's Rating:8
Reader's Rating: 0
Reader's Votes: 0
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