The new wave of bookish journey

Forget the solo seashore paperback: travellers at the moment are becoming a member of structured studying retreats that blend books, place and group.

At I’Brindellone, a trattoria in Florence,  a dozen women and men sit round a protracted desk, wine glasses in hand, deep in dialogue a few novel: Still Life, a novel by Sarah Winman. On the partitions cling pictures of the town’s 1966 flood when the River Arno burst its banks, killing 35 folks and destroying invaluable artistic endeavors. The group level on the photographs excitedly; Winman as soon as dined right here, noticed the identical pictures and planted the seed of her story.

Right now, meals is an afterthought; this literary circle of former strangers is on a Books in Places studying retreat – a part of an evolving wave of holidays that put studying, not sunbathing or sightseeing, centre stage. No longer content material with paperbacks by the pool, travellers are signing up for structured literary holidays that mix the ritual of studying with the pleasure of place. The result’s an uncommon hybrid: half trip, half guide membership, half cultural immersion.

“I was first drawn to Books in Places by a Facebook ad,” remembers Lyn Margerison, one of many members. “It showed the front cover of one of my very favourite books arranged on a table with a glass of wine, set against a piazza in Florence. The caption asked: ‘Do you enjoy reading books in the places in which they are set?’ My antennae were immediately tweaked.”

Margerison has since travelled from Dorset to Florence, Budapest and past on studying retreats. “For me, these holidays are the perfect combination of books and travel,” she explains. “I’ve always liked to read a book set in the place where I am holidaying, but a reading holiday offered a way to do that while meeting like-minded people. I always leave with a renewed enthusiasm for both reading and travelling – plus, usually, a much longer to-be-read list.”