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New York Resident
February 17, 2003
By Phil Hall
New York Resident Book Editor
Travels With My Wife
New Travel Book Combines Journey With Marriage and Leaves Her Holdings the Bags
Most travel writing is, admittedly, a bit of a bore. After all, travel writers are enjoying the best of all worlds, and it is uncommon to find anything slightly discomforting in their articles about far-off places and luxury establishments. Honestly, when was the last time you read a travel article or book that bluntly stated: "Don't go there -it's a dump!"?
Dominick A. Miserandino doesn't opt for the rude-boy approach, but at least his approach to travel writing is mercifully different. Miserandino, a Long Island journalist who publishes the popular online magazine TheCelebrityCafe.com, has authored a series of travel articles that also mirror the first year of married life. These articles, which are equal parts amusing and sincere, have been compiled into a delightful new book with the somewhat lengthy title, "How to Survive Your First Year of Marriage by Traveling; San Tropez, France to Helena, Arkansas" (Writers Club Press, 180 pages, $12.95).
Miserandino pays lopsided tribute to his charming bride, Margherita, literally from the first paragraph: "For her 29th birthday, my wife felt it was the perfect time to go on a small shopping trip to Toronto, Canada. Then again, in her opinion, almost any time is the perfect time for a shopping spree."
Miserandino happily avoids turning his book into a Borscht Belt joke collection but instead gives a fresh and honest approach to the various sights, sites, and shocks he encounters while doing the suitcase routine.
Miserandino's travels, which take him across America and through parts of Western Europe, are rich with mild absurdities: a Boston Santa Claus, stranded hundreds of feet up along side of an office building that he attempted to rappel down a la SpiderMan, his own moral concerns about having a Poconos hotel suite where the Jacuzzi is next to the toilet, having his wife scold him for "acting like a child in a Nashville science museum, and so forth. Imagine CondeNast Traveler, authored by David Lynch and you have an idea what Miserandino has produced.
While the book's title might suggest an equal partnership in terms of an anecdotal shenanigans and observations the book is clearly Miserandino's running commentary. Often his comments have a profoundly weird effect (he aproves of 4'11" Grand Ole Opry star Little Jimmy Dickens by stating: "There's nothing wrong with a diminutive country singer waiking around the stage every so often"), and clearly he takes in a great deal of tourist attractions with an old fashioned-guy approach (he cannot see himself performing Polynesia style flame dancing because the "fear of castration by burning would distract me too much").
However, if anyone has a sense humor, it is (or it should be) Margherita. The book's introduction cites her photography talents, but there are pictures by her are nowhere to be found. Nor is there a photo of her ... both front and back covers feature Miserandino as a solo act. Hopefully, Margherita wasn't the one who had to carry the bags while the couple went on their travels.
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