Around the World in 80 Books Challenge – Wrap!

“The Road goes ever on and on…”

Way back in March 2016, I decided to participate in the Around the World in 80 Books Challenge, created and hosted by Sarah and Lucy at Hard Book Habit. Here’s what they said:

Here’s the deal. You’ll need to read 80 books set or connected with the random destinations of your choice, then you blog about each book that you read en route. You can choose any books you like – this challenge is not limited to fiction – and the only catch is that you must read at least one book connected to each continent, one sea-based book, and a book that involves travel – think the Orient Express, flight, hot-air balloons, train journeys, car trips, etc… the rest is up to you.

(Sadly in the intervening years Hard Book Habit has ceased to exist, and as far as I know Sarah and Lucy are no longer blogging.)

Four and a half years later, I limped wearily home, having visited every continent, sailed every sea, travelled through time and even ventured into space.

My original plan, which for once I stuck to, was to go back to the book that inspired the challenge, Around the World in Eighty Days, and see if I could find books for each stage of Phileas Fogg’s original journey. Wikipedia not only told me where Fogg and his faithful servant Passepartout stopped, but they provided a map which became my logo for the challenge…

That would fill 27 of the 80 slots, and the other 53 would be detours – taking me anywhere and everywhere, but making sure to meet each of the requirements of the challenge.

So here it is – the final list, with links to all my reviews:

The Main Journey

1. London  – Martin Chuzzlewit
2. Orient Express – Travels with My Aunt
3. France – The Sisters of Versailles
4. Alps – Crossed Skis
5. Venice – Titian’s Boatman
6. Brindisi – That Summer in Puglia
7. Mediterranean Sea – Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Seas
8. Suez – Something to Answer For
9. Egypt – Palace Walk
10. Red Sea/Arabian Sea – Lord Jim
11. Bombay – Selection Day
12. Calcutta – A Rising Man
13. Kholby – The Jewel in the Crown
14. Elephant Travel – The Elephant’s Journey
15. Allahabad – The Sign of the Four
16. Indian Ocean/ South China Sea – A Dangerous Crossing
17. Hong Kong – How to Pick Up a Maid in Statue Square
18. Shanghai – Death of a Red Heroine
19. Yokohama – Around the World in Eighty Days
20. Pacific – Moby-Dick: Or, The White Whale
21. San Francisco – The Dain Curse
22. Sioux lands – Days Without End
23. Omaha – The Swan Gondola
24. New York – Three-Martini Lunch
25. Atlantic Ocean – Treasure Island
26. Queenstown (Cobh) Ireland – Dead Wake
27. London – The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

The Detours

1. The Hebrides – Coffin Road
2. Florida – Their Eyes Were Watching God
3. Iceland – Snowblind
4. Himalayas – Black Narcissus
5. Ireland – The Heather Blazing
6. Channel Islands – The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society
7. Australian Outback – Fear is the Rider
8. Portugal – The High Mountains of Portugal
9. Milan, Italy – The Murdered Banker
10. Havana, Cuba – A Heart So White
11. Saturn – 2001: A Space Odyssey
12. Kabul, Afghanistan – The Kite Runner
13. Vatican City – Conclave
14. Dresden, Germany – Slaughterhouse-Five
15. Scottish Highlands – Murder of a Lady
16. The French Riviera – Death on the Riviera
17. Kiev, Ukraine – The White Guard
18. North Korea – The Accusation
19. Chechnya – The Tsar of Love and Techno
20. Japan – Penance
21. Beijing, China – Braised Pork
22. Ancient Greece – House of Names
23. Bosnia and Herzegovina – Testimony
24. Moscow, Russia – Doctor Zhivago
25. Republic of the Congo – Brazzaville Beach
26. Thailand – Behind the Night Bazaar
27. Antarctic – Endurance
28. Wales – The Great God Pan and Other Horror Stories
29. Spain – The Man Who Loved Dogs
30. New Zealand – The Ice Shroud
31. Gibraltar – The Rock
32. Canada – Brother
33. Jordan – Appointment with Death
34. South Africa – The Good Doctor
35. Lebanon – Pearls on a Branch
36. Colombia – The Shape of the Ruins
37. Uruguay – Springtime in a Broken Mirror
38. Ancient Rome – Imperium
39. Norway – The Katharina Code
40. South Korea – The Plotters
41. Europe – Europe: A Natural History
42. Colonial Malay – The Night Tiger
43. Istanbul, Turkey – 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World
44. Papua New Guinea – Mister Pip
45.  Zululand – Nada the Lily
46.  East Germany – The Spy Who Came In from the Cold
47.  Mexico – The Pearl
48.  Nigeria – Things Fall Apart
49.  Öland, Sweden – Echoes from the Dead
50.  Sicily – The Leopard
51.  Ruritania – The Prisoner of Zenda
52.  The Arctic – Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus
53.  Romania – Sword

* * * * *

Highlights

I loved doing this challenge – probably the one I’ve enjoyed most of all the ones I’ve participated in. While I filled a lot of the spots on my journey from books I’d have been reading anyway, I also kept a weather eye open for books set in places I hadn’t yet visited, and that led me to read many books that probably would have otherwise passed me by. So to celebrate the end of the challenge, I’ve decided to highlight just five of the books, each of which I loved and probably wouldn’t have read without this incentive.

Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz

A family saga, set in Egypt to the backdrop of the end of WW1, the rise of nationalism and the dying days of colonial Egypt. It took me a long time to feel involved with this family and their community but once I did I became completely absorbed in the slow telling of their lives. Usually I’d be more interested in the out-going, more political lives of the sons, but in this case I found myself fascinated by Mahfouz’ depiction of the lives and feelings of the women – the total seclusion and lack of agency, and the way that the mothers themselves trained their daughters to accept, conform and even be contented with this half-life. A deserved classic, and for once a Nobel Prize-winning novel that I feel merits that accolade.

The High Mountains of Portugal by Yann Martel

There are three distinct sections in this novel, each very different but with common themes running through them, and all linked to a small town in the High Mountains, Tuizelo. It is a subtle discussion of the evolution vs. faith debate, with the old evolutionary saw of “risen apes, not fallen angels” appearing repeatedly. Chimps appear in some form in each of the sections, sometimes symbolically, sometimes actually. I found the whole thing an original and insightful approach to the question that provokes thought without forcing any specific answers on the reader. The writing is nothing short of brilliant. It flows smoothly, feels light and airy, but is full of insight into grief and love and heartache, and has left some indelible images in my mind.

Endurance by Alfred Lansing

This is a straightforward, factual telling of the story of Ernest Shackleton and his crew, and their failed 1914 bid to cross the Antarctic on foot from west to east. It’s also one of the most stirring and emotionally turbulent books I’ve ever read. I found myself totally caught up in the men’s adventure, willing them on, crying over each new disaster, celebrating with them over any small triumph. Talk about emotional rollercoaster! As it got towards the end, my tension levels were going through the roof, just as they would have been had these men been personal friends – indeed, after the long journey I’d made in their company, I truly felt they were.

Springtime in a Broken Mirror by Mario Benedetti

Santiago is a political prisoner in Montevideo, Uruguay, in the 1970s. His family and friends are scattered, exiled from the country they call home. Although the book is based around the revolutions of South America, it is not about politics as such; rather, it is about the impact that political upheaval has on the individuals caught up in it. It’s about home and exile, loneliness, longing, belonging. It’s about loyalty and love, and sometimes despair. It’s profoundly moving – full of emotional truth. And, in the end, it holds out hope: that the human spirit has the resilience to find new ways of living when the old ones are taken away. A wonderful read.

10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World by Elif Shafak

Tequila Leila’s body is dead, but her brain has not yet shut completely down. As her consciousness slowly fades, she finds herself drifting through memories of her life – the childhood that made her the woman she would become, her family, her loves and, most of all, her friends. And along the way, we are given a picture of the underbelly of Istanbul, of those on the margins finding ways to live in a society that rejects them. The prose is wonderful, the many stories feel utterly true and real, and they are beautifully brought together to create an intensely moving picture of a life that might pass unremarked and unmourned by society, but showing how remarkable such a life can be in its intimate details and how mourning is a tribute gained by a loving, generous soul regardless of status.

This was an incredibly hard choice, since I tried hard to fill most of the slots with great books, and there are very few in the final list that I wouldn’t wholeheartedly recommend. And I thoroughly enjoyed rounding the whole thing off by reading the wonderful Around the World in Eighty Days itself, which not only filled the impossible Yokohama spot but was an excellent way to bring my travels to an end.

Thanks for joining me on my epic journey. 😀