March travels to Alaska, North Korea, Australia, Dubai & NY

Although I am an avid traveller, I am neither an airline pilot nor an international spy (even if both professions sound rather intriguing…)

I did travel to all these places last month, but alas, only on the written page.

Credit: freeimageslive.co.uk

And isn’t that the point of novels? To transport us around the world, to different periods of time, allowing us to crawl under the skin of another character? When I start thinking and reasoning like the character in the latest novel I’m reading, I know the transformation has been complete.

I read lots of enjoyable novels last month that allowed me to do exactly that.

Most recently, I wrapped up Kristin Hannah’s novel The Great Alone. Although I had been less impressed by an earlier Hannah novel I read, I adored this coming-of-age tale of a young girl living in a challenging family environment in the wilds of Alaska in the 1970s.

Before that, I loved the novel by Korean novelist Krys Lee, entitled How I Became North Korean. The novel is beautifully written and follows three young people, originally from North Korea, who make their way to the Korean-Chinese border while seeking different lives for themselves.

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion took me to Australia for this amusing, lighthearted novel about a highly intelligent but socially awkward man who has devised a ‘foolproof’ test for finding a wife. I always have a soft spot for novels about social misfits, and Professor Tillman fit the bill perfectly.

And Chris Bohjalian’s The Flight Attendant had me in transit through New York, Dubai, Paris and Rome – all cities I frequent and (in two out of four of the cases) live in. I’m not usually drawn by novels of international intrigue and spy networks, but this was a happy exception to the rule. I loved following Cassie’s train wreck of a life as she jets around the world trying to hide from the consequences of a drunken one-night stand gone horribly wrong.

These were my vicarious, jet lag-free travels during the month of March.

And what about you, readers? To which locations have your recently-read-novels transported you? Happy reading and armchair travelling to all!

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