I was expecting something a bit more thorough. This work is extremely selective in its choices of destinations--fun to read, but not a reference guide for prospective travel destinations. ( )

For the true bibliophile, it's armchair traveling... for the things that kept you in your armchair to begin with. A rather narrow listing of locations noted for fictional happenings rather than actual ones. Note that its focus remains on Europe and America.
It's certainly not a book you read cover to cover, but it's charming to pick up when you've got a destination in mind (provided your destination is listed and you know where to find that info) to see if there are any noteworthy literary landmarks for you to work into your schedule. Keep it on the travel shelf and peruse at your leisure every now and then. Its big failing is a lack of an index. Dear me. So even then, you need to dig for what you might like. So perhaps you should read it outright, and flag things that you think might someday be useful.
I wasn't heartily impressed, but then, I suppose a more comprehensive guide would be too daunting. Ah well. ( )

A fun book to dream and wish over. My only complaint would be a desire for more authors that I am familiar with other then the big ones already included in other similar works.

Great information about visiting the birthplace/ official museum/ favorite bar of literary icons such as Austen, Shakespeare, Poe, Christie and more. I was able to add some interesting side trips to a visit to New York. ( )

An excellent and engaging guide for the bookish traveller. Hopefully, this will be expanded upon, though. ( )

When I first received "Novel Destinations", I wasn't sure what to expect. Being a Sherlock Holmes fan, I've seen many of the books that trace the steps Sherlock would have taken both during his time, and in current day. Because of this, I wasn't sure if the book would cover the travels of our favorite literary subjects, or those of their authors. Maybe both. Just to let you know, if you haven't already read this book, it is the travels of the authors that is covered.
This is a reference book that you are much more apt to browse on occasion rather than read cover to cover. A lot of information is packed in here, and it doesn't lend itself to straight through reading. Included are listings for authors houses, favorite vacation spots, and even bars and clubs that were frequented by the literati. You'll find hours of operation, e-mail addresses, web sites and phone numbers. Unfortunately, what you won't find, unless changes have been made between the reader's copy and the final result, is a lot of organization and quick accessibility.
Obviously there are far too many authors to be able to do justice to them all, so it appears the authors of this book may have picked the ones they enjoyed most, and chose to center on them. I don't know this is the case, but while there is a lot of information for Jane Austen, Ernest Hemingway and Edith Wharton; there's not as much as I would have expected for Conan Doyle, Stephen King, and some of the more contemporary authors. Again you can't cover everyone, so I guess you can't please everyone.
The book is broken into two main sections. The first is a look at various places in America and Europe associated with different authors. Part two deals with ten locations and the ten authors most closely associated with them. This in itself seems to create some confusion since the ten authors in part two are also seen in various sections of part one. Even within part one, there are subdivisions for mystery, poetry, horror and literature and some of the authors have different information in more than one section. This does not make gathering all of an authors information easy, and the reader's copy had no sign of an index.
It was great to have the information regarding these destinations available, but the ability to easy use the information is equally important, and unfortunately, this is an area that I didn't feel was successful. Even assuming an index is added to the retail version of this book, I might continue looking for literary travel books that might have a bit more organization. ( )

This book is a great idea executed only about a third as well as it deserves.

On the positive side, it's a valiant effort to cram in mentions of every sort of book-related holiday activity possible. There are museums, authorial birth- and burial-sites, festivals, hotels, libraries, and even a page explaining Bookshop Tourism.

This is exciting for me (I thought I invented Bookshop Tourism!) but leads to one of the negative aspects--it's a rather disorganized book. I don't think this was particularly avoidable, since if you organize activities by geographical location you'll separate those related to authors who lived in different places, and vice versa. But I wish there were an index--perhaps this will be in the published version--and I really think that some of the material could have been grouped better.

More important to me is what this book is missing. It seems that the authors were working from a definition of literature straight out of their old high school English anthologies. Britain, Paris, Russia, and New England are abundantly represented; Hemingway and Steinbeck pop up everywhere, but that's really it.

Every author associated by this book with a site of interest is white, save two--Zora Neale Hurston and Frederick Douglass. Harlem itself barely rates a mention.

I don't understand the authors' policy toward the rest of the world, either. They don't restrict their book to sites of English literary interest, since they represent Hugo, Tolstoy, and Dante. Nor can they be prioritizing accessible sites--many of the destinations and activities they mention are tremendously expensive. So I can't see why they leave out Latin America, Australia, Africa, and the entirety of Asia. It's as though they forgot that the non-Western world might also be capable of producing and commemorating great writers.

So whether you're an armchair traveler or really planning a literary holiday, Novel Destinations won't give you a chance to contemplate the tiny Mexican villages Mariano Azuela fought in as he reproduced them in Los de Abajo, Assia Djebar's Algiers, Aime Cesaire's Martinique, Ngugi wa Thiongo's Kenya, Kate Grenville's Sydney, Graham Greene's Freetown, even Toni Morrison's Ohio... in other words, for the average American reader this book fails the National-Geographic promise of expanding horizons and instead remains, in the end, very provincial.

Wonderful for the literary traveler and the arm chair traveler alike. ( )

Novel Destinations is a bibliophile's dream. A compact, attractive volume, it's chock full of enough information to fuel a lifetime of literary tourism.

The book is divided into two parts. Part One consists of a potpourri of literary attractions, ranging from author houses and museums to destinations frequented by writers ranging from Edith Wharton to Ernest Hemingway, to literary festivals and bookstore tours (a pastime I've engaged in with great pleasure) and concluding with literary lodgings, restaurants and bars.

Part Two focuses on tourist opportunities in places associated with the lives of ten famous writers, from Dublin (Joyce) to Concord, MA (Alcott) to Key West (Hemingway), for literary types who want a more in depth travel experience.

Like a pair of chefs writing about their favorite restaurants, the authors are knowledgeable and informative, consistently conveying their enthusiasm for this unique project. A previous reviewer has noticed the absence of an index, but I assume that's only a deficiency in the ARC, as the table of contents identifies indices for both authors and destinations. There's ample contact information that will allow readers to conduct their own followup research.

This isn't the type of book anyone is likely to sit down with and read from cover to cover. But whether you're actually planning a literary trip, or simply want to sit by the fireside contemplating that delightful possibility, it is a volume guaranteed to provide many hours of pleasurable and rewarding reading. ( )

Admittedly, I'm a sucker for anything that combines travel and literature, but I thought this book was terrific. It combines a wealth of information organized in a way that makes it a delight to peruse. The forward (by Matthew Pearl) was engaging, as was the introduction by the authors. And the voice of the text was lively and fun. Section titles like “Eat Your Words: Literary Places to Sip and Sup” and “Unpersuaded: Jane Austen’s Persuasion and Nothanger Abbey” are just the start. It’s sprinkled throughout with interesting tidbits on the lives of the writers, things like Dickens’ Gad’s Hill Place being coincidentally cited on the locale Shakespeare set Falstaf’s highway robbery in Henry IV and Robert Frost's struggle to make a living farming while suffering such stinging rejection of his poetry as “We find that The Atlantic has no place for your vigorous prose.” Since Agatha Christie is my weakness, I was delighted to see the pages on her. I left the book feeling I would have enjoyed it even if I were only an armchair traveler, but, since I’m not, already planning my next excursion that might combine my two loves. ( )

This book definitely meets my expectations of a National Geographic publication. I expected descriptions of places where authors had lived and worked but was thrilled to find tours of the places within these great authors' novels mapped out for me.

These are not the staid entries of most travel guides. The authors provide a bit of history and biography with each entry. This, combined with quality writing, makes Novel Destinations a great read for any lover of literature, travel, or both. ( )

Erica McDonald:

Literary-minded travelers rejoice! As I really can’t see myself ever jumping out of a plane like they did in the movie, “The Bucket List,” this book instantly became my bibliophile “bucket list.” Numerous destinations based on the wanderings and residences of my favorite authors as well as their most memorable settings and characters are presented here alongside practical travel information, fascinating facts, literary gossip, and great reading suggestions. My first literary-minded trip centered around Anne of Green Gables when my mother brought me to Prince Edward Island. I spent a semester of college in Jane Austen’s Bath, and even visited her home at Chawton in Hampshire. Next on my “bucket list” is Louisa May Alcott’s historic home in Concord, MA, where she wrote and set Little Women. Whatever your bibliophile “bucket list” includes, you are sure to find them here in Novel Destinations. Makes a great companion book for reading groups!