A Sentimental Journey is a witty and amusing read. You don't have to be familiar with the specific travel authors Sterne is satirizing as long as you're familiar with the type of authors he's targeting. There are no grand descriptions of famous places or litany of travel routes and meals; the actual traveling takes a backseat to his encounters with people. And of course Sterne's sense of humor is very evident.

Once you've finished A Sentimental Journey, do yourself a favor and skip right to the fun little fable (and its interpretations) in A Political Romance. The Journal to Eliza was never meant for publication and reads like the diary of a besotted thirteen-year-old girl. He wrote it when he was in his fifties (and almost on his deathbed) for a 23 year old woman who he'd known for three months before she had to sail back to her husband in India. It's a repetitive set of declarations of eternal love and narratives of how he took her picture with him to parties so he could pass it around and show all his friends. That he also wrote A Sentimental Journey during this time is the only evidence we have that he hadn't become as tiresome a bore as his journal indicates. ( )