Berlin with Wolfgang Herrndorf's Why We Took The Car

Presents from in-laws are rarely well targeted. A blind folded young rookie shooting darts at the pub might have better luck of hitting the bullseye. With this in mind, I have to hand it to the in-laws. Why We Took The Car is an absolute banger. 

Being from the island that Her Majesty deemed worthy of a gaol, it’s rare to be exposed to any literature that’s not originally written in the Kings. My German wife and I constantly marvel at the books that each of us didn’t read growing up. So, it was rad to be introduced to a modern German text whose prose could match the pace Berlin.

WWTTC kicks off in Berlin and circles back there but it’s really a book set on the road. It’s a young adult novel but in such a way that it puts you back there. Mike Klingenburg, a kid with lots to offer but too shy to reveal it. Tortured by isolation but too disgusted by the phoniness of what it seems to take to fit in. Desperate for female attention but more invisible than wind. Just me? 

Just like Nick in The Great Gatsby, Mike is the narrator but he’s not the namesake. In German the book is called Tschick, way better, right? I’m not sure who decides these translation changes. I was once in Paris when the American film Friends With Benefits came out. In France it was given the subtle and nuanced title of Sex Friends. Anyway, Tschick (pronounced Chick) is an impoverished Russian ex-pat who regularly turns up to school several vodkas deep and seems to pay no mind to anyone. The only thing Mike and Tschick have in common is that they’re both equally outcast. Mike initially fails to see this as the basis for a friendship but after a little coercion they buddy up. Summer holidays roll around, parents aren’t on the scene, for both middle and lower class reasons of neglect, Tschick steals a Lada (If you’re not familiar, look them up. Russian engineering at its finest.) and the two hit the road, donning duct tape moustaches at times to hide their youthful appearance, lest the two underage punters attract any suspicious glances. 

So what about Berlin? It’s a world unto itself. It’s German but not in the way Munich is. It’s German in the sense that it’s ultra-liberal. Owning their past and moving forward has arguably made Germany the beacon of the free world and Berlin stands as the centerpiece. The wall that once divided the city is now a street art gallery, more likely to be tearing down oppression than propping it up. English is almost more of an advantage here than German. Museums, restaurants, bars, cafes and clubs, Berlin has too much to see and do for me to pretend I’m going to know whether you want recommendations on raving or galleries. Most importantly, Berlin packs most of the best that an urban jungle has to offer and everyone is welcome. Many of the corners are now filled with refugees, hustling to get by but even this is largely accepted, part of the rich tapestry. 

Berlin reminds me of my favourite quote from WWTTC; it sums up why we have to read, travel and throw ourselves headlong into the whole big mess: 

‘Ever since I was a little boy my father had told me that the world was a bad place. The world is bad and people are bad. Don’t trust anyone, don’t talk to strangers, all of that. My parents drilled that into me, my teachers drilled that into me, even TV drilled that into me. When you watched the local news - people were bad. When you saw primetime investigative shows - people were bad. And maybe it was true, maybe ninety-nine percent of the people were bad. But the strange thing was that on this trip, Tschick and I had run into almost only people from the one percent who weren’t bad.’

If Lost Boys’ Book Club had a manifesto it would read something like that. Don’t trust second hand accounts. Read this book and explore Berlin for yourself.

• Stu McKerihan 

Roadtrips with Jack Kerouac's On The Road

It’s impossible to talk about this book without trying to establish what ‘Beat’ is. An exalted exhaustion, a beatific vision, a direct line to God enjoyed by the blessed in heaven. It’s manifest in kickwriting; ‘writing only what kicks you and keeps you overtime awake from sheer mad joy’. Spontaneous prose reflected in its soundtrack, ‘Let’s hear no more about jazz critics and those who wonder about bop: - I like my whiskey wild, I like Saturday night in the shack to be crazy, I like the tenor to be woman-mad, I like things to GO and rock and be flipped, I want to be stoned if I’m going to be stoned at all, I like to be gassed by a back-alley music….’ Beat was a movement, and a generation, and On The Road became the manifesto. It pointed the alienated, restless and dissatisfied towards a quest that began on the road. What better companion on your own road trip?

While the road trip mapped out in this book is akin to some kind of twisted spiritual quest for the American Dream, the specific locations become less significant. It’s the personal inner journeys and the ceaseless nature of the prose that captures the kind of reasons to hit the road. Sal Paradise is the autobiographical protagonist but it’s the other main character, the maniacal prophet of experience, Dean Moriarty, that drives the story. Picture that friend who’s a real bad influence but you’re kind of happy to go along with them because you’re bored with playing it safe and staying in your comfort zone. You crave the unhinged freedom they seem to have.

Without really intending to, Kerouac challenged the complacency and prosperity of postwar America. It’s a sentiment that still seems to resonate, the escapism just too contagious. He also packaged these challenging sentiments in a new way. Rumour has it that Kerouac taped together twelve-foot-long sheets of drawing paper and fed them into his typewriter as a continuous roll, his typing described as a rolling thunder. Paragraphs be damned, the book hardly gives you a chance to catch a breath, let alone a chapter break to put it down.

Culturally, this book was huge, capturing a feeling of consciousness. Pulling out of the day-to-day and onto the open road holds an appeal that doesn’t seem limited to any time or place. The breakneck speed of this novel means it should always be riding on your dash when you pull out onto the freeway.

-Stu McKerihan

“[...]the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes “Awww!” 
― Jack Kerouac, On the Road

Costa Rica (Puerto Viejo) with Weisbecker's In Search of Captain Zero

My initiation to Costa Rica was tame. Tagging along on a good friend's family Christmas vacation, we were shuttled from San Juan to the air conned villa, a poolside bar view of the sleepy off-season Pacific rollers that gently washed onto the molten black sand of Jacó. After a week of relaxing and some raucous New Year's celebrations my mate and I hopped a bus from San Juan over the mountainous rainforest of the Costa Rican interior and crawled our way into the Caribbean coastal town of Puerto Viejo. As we disembarked we were no longer tourists but travellers, travellers in search.

The town was clogged with people and we struggled the streets with our boardbags, constantly being told there was no room in the inn. A fellow traveller we met on the bus later told us he spent his first night in town wrapped in his boardbag on the sand, being mauled by mosquitoes.

The air was dense with humidity and Reggaeton that blasted from over-driven speakers, the sound of the Caribbean. Afro-Caribbean dudes with sun-bleached mushrooms of hair lounged on logs by the calm lagoon that was fringed by wash further out to sea.

The town was but a few streets, circling the lagoon and stretching back a little. Bars, cafes and hostels all had the look of having been built from repurposed flotsam and driftwood, real Caribbean surf shacks.

By teaming up with some other lost souls we eventually secured a room for a reasonable price and went in search of Puerto Viejo's aquatic crown jewel, Salsa Brava. It was meant to be right off the lagoon but we hadn't spotted it on our way past. Translated, Brave Sauce, we knew little of it, except that everyone spoke about it with reverence, hushed tones or wide-eyed hyperbole. Even when aware of its location, standing on the curved and coconut laden shore, it's not that easy to get a read on. All this naivety turned out to be a blessing. If I'd known the full extent, I wouldn't have slept for weeks in the lead up.

A torrent, akin to the surge of a swollen river, tore out from the lagoon, striking towards the incoming swells. Maintaining a steady footing on the coral shelf amidst the surge felt like trying to brake your bike with bare feet whilst crossing a bed of nails.

Once off the shelf you were hurtling towards the gap in the reef, barely a few metres wide, with towering Caribbean ground swells looking certain to implode on your head, towards the supposed safety of the channel behind the take off. The angle from here provides a terrifying view through the mutated and heaving first point, giving you the choice to aim straight across at it or head seaward, hoping to avoid having the whole Caribbean pitch onto your head as it meets the shallow obstruction of the reef.

Every take off was beyond vertical. If you could find your feet you were in the barrel, though not a short intense barrel. The wall would regularly stretch out and build momentum, some to the point I was convinced my board might self destruct from maximum velocity.

In Search Of Captain Zero is a love letter to Salsa Brava from a wanton vagabond so love sick with surf that his prose become pirate poetry in motion. The book traverses memoir, road and quest, though I must apologise because I have, like a selfishly over-excited lover, rushed towards the climax prematurely. Weisbecker rattles his home on wheels all the way from New York, across country and down virtually the entire West Coast of Central America before hitting the end of the road.

Whilst that adventure itself is a page turner, it's his reflective interludes, chronicling anecdotes from the outlaw fringes of earlier decades chasing waves and smuggling bud, that really drew me in.

There's a distinctly American boastfulness at times in the voice but it's countered by some very raw honesty and razor sharp observations.

You would be hard pressed to find a better surf adventure than the Caribbean coasts of Central America over December and January and you definitely wont find a better tale than In Search of Captain Zero to join you in the hammock between sessions.

-Stu McKerihan

“Profoundly rootless and intensely interested in the world around him in all its facets, the explorer type often has a passion that gives added meaning to his wanderings (the vast majority are solo males). Surfing is the quintessential example here, for there are very few endeavours that so perfectly combine travel/exploration with a creatively satisfying relationship to the environment.”

Bavaria and Poland with Markus Zusak's The Book Thief

I met Kelly Slater in the water once.

I giggled, stole little bird-like glances, and couldn't catch a wave until he paddled in. It was disgraceful. You may well see that same level of fanboy emerge here. The Book Thief is one of the few books I've read where each sentence feels like it has been crafted and painstakingly shaped until it's perfect; Where the imagery in the prose is so beautiful, it elicits an audible groan I usually reserve for POV shots from Skeleton Bay. 

Set in 1940s Germany, the tale is told by Death, who is tired and jaded from the recent spike in his workload. And his story focuses on a young girl, named Liesel who revels in the freedom of books & literature in a society which preferred books when they were on fire. The strange thing is, that plot probably doesn't grab you... and I'm not sure it's supposed to. Death tells you who dies and outlines the plot in the first chapter:

• A girl

• Some words

• An accordionist

• Some fanatical Germans

• A Jewish fist fighter

• And quite a lot of thievery

It's the reason the movie is good, but not phenomenal. The appeal lies somewhere else. The true beauty (as it is for Liesel) is in the words on each page. It's the Skeleton Bay of prose: A thing of beauty which unfolds down the line, and never seems to close out. This imagery gives Liesel and Rudy an almost transcendental quality, as though there is a quiet depth and nobility to their actions. 584 pages later, they feel like idealised children versions of who you wish you would have been if you had been alive during WW2. They are flawed humans; Rudy, self sabotaging, and Liesel stubborn and volatile. And yet, they feel like your friends, and it remains the only novel to have brought me to tears. This is more impressive when you consider that the ending is spelled out midway through the book.

Perhaps the most admirable aspect of the book is the way that Zusak manages to explore how humans are capable of both extreme selflessness, love and beauty, as well as hatred, murder and genocide. Death's sign off on the final page:

'A LAST NOTE FROM YOUR NARRATOR:

I am haunted by humans'

And it's up to you what he means by 'haunted'. Is it the memory of love and sacrifice which never leaves him? Or, is it the atrocities of the Holocaust, when "the sky was the colour of Jews". Think on that metaphor for long enough, and you will eventually be brought to the crematorium and smokestacks of Birkenau and Auschwitz. Before I arrived in Poland, I wondered if there would be some kind of "spiritual heaviness" about the place, something grotesque. But the barracks sit on green grass, hemmed in by thick green Polish forests. There is something strangely beautiful about it, if you are able to momentarily forget where you are.

Beautiful and grotesque.

And we find ourselves at the same conclusion that Zusak reaches about humanity.

Beautiful. Grotesque.

It's little wonder Death is haunted...

So get yourself to Deutschland unt Polska, and bring Zusak along for the ride.

-Tim Clarke

"The words were on their way, and when they arrived, she would hold them in her hands like the clouds, and she would wring them out like the rain."

Brittany (North West France) and Essen (North West Germany) with Anthony Doerr's All The Light We Cannot See

How are you with puzzles? I'm all for word play and riddles but jigsaws leave me cold. Doerr's All The Light We Cannot See, whilst being a joy to read, must have been a real doozy to write. The fact it took him 10 years from idea to completion would certainly suggest so. The reason why I raise the puzzle idea is that the narrative jumps back and forth between the two protagonists; an impoverished young German orphan named Werner Pfennig growing up in a future-less mining town in the north west of the country and a young French girl who becomes blind at the age of 6 but thankfully has an academic father who works at the National Museum of Paris and stimulates her mind with models and countless books written in braille. The depth of character is out of this world! Supposedly some paragraphs took over 30 hours of research to write! Even if it hadn't won the Pulitzer for fiction that sort of effort demands some kind of life-time achievement award.

In short, the book is a masterpiece.

There would be few events more written about than World War II but this book miraculously achieves something new, largely thanks to the nuances of those who drive the story forward. Sympathy for a Nazi? You can decide for yourself but questions of morality, good and evil, are scattered all through this gem.

The spark for the story came from a chance observation on the subway in New York when Doerr listened on as a man complained profusely at the terrible reception he was getting on his phone. The irony of being 10s of metres underground and being frustrated at the lack of reception was not lost on Doerr, who began to wonder about the magic of things like radio frequencies and hearing a voice over the phone or radio and how much of this light we couldn't see.

Despite Werner's childhood town of Zollverein, just outside Essen in Germany, housing what is non-ironically referred to as the most beautiful coal mine in the world, designed in the Bauhaus style would you believe? The real star of the novel is Saint Malo, a coastal fairytale of a town in north west France. Its sizeable ramparts and unmistakably French houses that rest beside the sea make it the sort of place you would want to flee to, even without a war on at home. The place was blown to bits by the Allies, which you can read more about in the book, but incredibly, the formidable Malouins pieced it back together, so its still got that ancient feel to it.

Now, if the sound of a romantic sea side town and a Pulitzer prize winning novel isn't getting you hot under the collar, shame on you. Never fear though, a little word to the wise, Saint Malo is in the region of Brittany. So what? I hear you say. So, Brittany is wave stacked and the only time you'll catch a crowd here is during the peak of summer in August. Don't be a sheep. Rather than sit whining in a congested line-up in Capbreton, set your compass due north and see the light.!

-Stu McKerihan

“To men like that, time was a surfeit, a barrel they watched slowly drain. When really, he thinks, it’s a glowing puddle you carry in your hands; you should spend all your energy protecting it. Fighting for it. Working so hard not to spill one single drop.”

Lake District (Cumbria) with William Wordsworth

I’m calling it: William Wordsworth might well be the founding father of the Lost Boys' Book Club.

Think about it, the guy was well travelled, was inspired by nature, and wasn’t afraid to stick it to the man (he was the only Poet Laureate to take a healthy income from the Crown without ever writing a single poem for them). Hell, he may have even qualified cos Wordsworth is just such an appropriate name! The ultimate example of normative determinism, a la Fire Lieutenant Les McBurney. I’ll start at the beginning...

As you drive into the Lake District in the north of England, the only fitting response is ‘How could this not lead you to write poetry?’ The lakes themselves would not look out of place at the foot of Canadian peaks, and the mountains lurch up with such intent that they more closely resemble Norwegian fjords. And the flowers… You might well think to yourself “This old sea hound is never going to get excited about a flower!” Well hold up, Judge Reinhold, cos I thought the same thing! But there I was, amped among the bluebells and daffodils. They litter the green meadows with specks of blue, yellow and red, and were the inspiration for one of Wordsworth’s more well known poems;

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Before you go judging him on how much he froths on flowers, remember that some people might find our love for waves equally dumb. And one man’s meat is another man’s poison. Wordsworth might be considered the first Lost Boy because he believed all necessary life lessons could be taught by nature. He loved it. In his mind, the woods were a better teacher than Mr Jefferson, your Year 9 English teacher who spent his time trying to rip you in front of the class... The natural world was such an inspiration to him that most of his poems were written while walking the peaks of Cumbria, and he would try and write them down when he got home. He also thought that poetry should be written for the common man, not just for people with monocles. It makes his poetry readable. It’s somewhat simple, but still brutally profound. In doing so, he kickstarted English Romanticism, and for that, we salute him.

When you visit the Lake District, get into some Wordsworth. The poetry on the page will perfectly describe the poetry of the hills, lakes and sprawling meadows. Find a quiet peak and get some flower barrels. 

-Tim Clarke 

Sumba by boat with Jock Serong's On The Java Ridge

A pastel abstract painting of a sky juxtaposed by the perfect symmetry of the Indian Ocean swell lines curving around a shallow atoll. No one to see it but you and your close knit crew howling from the deck.
An Indo boat trip is a rite of passage as a surfer and images similar to ones mentioned above cloud our thoughts from the moment we take any interest in riding waves.
Perfection is out there, smattered around the seemingly endless archipelago of Indonesia but On The Java Ridge reminds us that something more sinister lurks not far from our affluence fuelled pursuit of this dream.
Serong deftly captures the varied Australian psyche within the microcosm that is the typical crew aboard a surf boat trip. Traversing back and forth between Canberra and the waters off Sumba, Serong's perceived disconnect between people and political policy becomes cavernous. What transpires is a thought provoking exploration of prejudice, perceived difference and humanity, brought to the fore when surf tourism and people smuggling come face to face.

Serong's triumph is in maintaining the nuances of the characters so no one becomes merely a parody within the message.

Compassion before politics is harder to argue with when you know and understand someone and that's what makes this book the perfect companion to an Indo boat trip. It's a reminder that we're all chasing something better, whether that's a wave or a way of life.
-Stu McKerihan

'She slowed the Java Ridge as the colours of the reef on Halura's southern side rose from the blue. The powerful diesels burbled at low revs and the bow-wave became sluggish and loud. The boat pitched and rolled with the swells passing under it. In the distance they could see the thatched roofs of the village on Halura's western tip. On the steep hills behind the houses, the jungle was so thick that nothing- not a fence, an aerial or a roof-disturbed it.'

Sunrise over Halura Island from the deck of the Sri Noa Noa.

Paris with George Orwell's Down & Out in Paris & London

The romance of travel is dealt a sickening blow the moment you have to find employment. For a period, the novelty of a new place and all its mysteries can sustain you but depending upon the work, this can be short lived. How many of us have faced the slings and arrows of a dead end job in an effort to extend our stay somewhere or to ward off the looming threat of starvation?

Down & Out In Paris & London is a deep dive into this world.

Memories of stuffing Tupperware filled backpacks with food from the cheap, gambling subsidised buffets during a snowboard season in Lake Tahoe when I was 19 came flooding back on reading this. Minimum wage survival is celebrated whilst on the road but the tales of 1920s poverty that Orwell experiences and documents are truly harrowing.

The book is journalistic in its approach to the concept of poverty, with the characters and locales becoming the stars of the narrative and educating Orwell and subsequently us on what life looks like on the bottom rung of the ladder.

His attention to detail brings the cities to life, the grittier side close up and an outsider's perspective on the finer parts.

What stood out to me in this book is how Orwell treats travel. An opportunity to learn. Its the people that you meet and the experiences that you wouldn't have if you never left the comfort zone of home that make travel valuable, not just relaxing in a deckchair for a week as a break from routine. So take a leaf out of Orwell's book and extend your stay and engage with those you wouldn't come across back home. Flying solo is the best way to stretch yourself.

Oh and whilst in Paris; walk the stairs to Sacre Coeur and eat crepe Nutella and drink a bottle of something red with the word chateau on the label, wander the stores and streets of La Marais and eat falafel, cycle along The Seine and stop for baguettes and brie at the foot of the Eiffel Tower and wash it down with another red whilst seated at a roadside bistro, preferably Cafe Les Deux Magots, frequented by the Lost Generation writers and if you run out of things to read then Shakespeare and Company in the Latin Quarter opposite the Notre-Dame has you covered.

You'll never be impoverished for something to do in Paris, so get at it.

-Stu McKerihan

'It was lamplight – that strange purplish gleam of the Paris lamps – and beyond the river the Eiffel Tower flashed from top to bottom with zigzag sky signs, like enormous snakes of fire. Streams of cars glided silently to and fro, and women, exquisite-looking in the dim light strolled up and down the arcade.'

Portugal with Yann Martel's The High Mountains of Portugal

Yann Martel, of Life of Pi fame, is back at it again. His penchant for producing esoteric allegorical novels is on show in The High Mountains of Portugal, as he bewilders and challenges his readers all over again.

The story is split into three micro-narratives spanning the 20th century. Firstly,we meet Tomas in turn of the century Lisbon. In true ‘Martelian’ fashion, Tomas walks everywhere backwards. Your brain starts ticking over… Ah Martel, you rascal, what does this tell us about the human condition? I’ll sit with this for as long as it takes! Two pages later, he tells you. Damn. It is Tomas’ only option to object. He sees others, life, God, and wishes to object to the cruelty he sees around him. It’s the last desperate attempt to have something on his terms. But that explanation is the only freebie Martell throws you. The rest of the novel requires a whole lot of thought to piece together.

After Tomas, comes Eusebio in 1948, a pathologist who performs an autopsy that seems to weave in and out of the surreal like his needle as he sews up cadavers. Lastly, we are introduced to Peter, a Canadian Senator who moves to Portugal in 1988 with an Ape named Odo. If your Pi-dar is pinging, calm down. It’s only a superficial resemblance.

And then the story ends. We don’t get the convenient explanation like we did in Pi as if we were Martel’s disciples, trusted with the secrets of the kingdom. In High Mountains, we are the crowds who are left to work it out. “Those who have ears, let them hear!” So how do we hear? What do we do with these stories? The links are present but cryptic, and every review of the book seems to summarise the plot and conveniently forget to explain what they thought Martell was getting at. Amongst the Lost Boys, our interpretations varied wildly. Crazily, it even feels like Martel doesn’t quite know what it’s getting at when he speaks about the book. But that’s PoMo for you, MoFo. Interpretation is what you make of it! But for what it’s worth, here’s one interpretation which you can take or leave: Life is ultimately devoid of purpose or hope. It’s a grim existence where one must walk backwards to avoid it, where suffering defines your character, and where fulfilment is as elusive as an Iberian Rhinoceros charging across the high mountains of Portugal.

It’s certainly worth reading this as you move throughout Portugal. From the earliest page, you can re-trace Tomas’ journey through Lisbon, and the description takes on a whole new level when you’re literally on the same street as the character. And in that regard, it’s worth reading even if you aren’t someone who likes to dive into something tricky. It’s beautifully written and heart wrenching all at once.

But if you find yourself walking through the (not so) High Mountains of Portugal, and you’ve figured it out, do let us know. Probably let Martel know too. He’s just as in the dark as you…

-Tim Clarke

'In Portugal the sunshine is often pearly, lambent, tickling, neighbourly. So too, in its own way, is the dark. There are dense, rich, and nourishing pockets of gloom to be found in the shadows of houses, in the courtyards of modest restaurants, on the hidden sides of large trees. During the night, these pockets spread, taking to the air like birds. The night, in Portugal, is a friend.'

Ireland with Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels

The tragedy of Jonathan Swift’s legacy is that his most famous work Gulliver’s Travels has been immortalised by the woeful Jack Black film adaptation. Don’t mention this atrocity to the Irish. They rankle at the merest mention. They also pronounce ‘film’ using two syllables: /fil-um/ but that’s another issue.

Gulliver’s Travels is undeniably odd.. On surface level, it’s the story of Gulliver who finds himself visiting strange lands, where he is a giant, another where he is miniscule, and another where talking horses reign. He manages to escape back home each time, and swears that he will never leave the safety of home again. Later that day, he sets out from the safety of home, and ends up somewhere more bizarre than the previous trip.

But in reality, the story is a lot deeper than it seems. It is actually a satire of human nature, and Swift is questioning how people become corrupted and do bad things to one another. And here is why you must read it whilst in Ireland. It is a nation still in chaos. The tension between Britain and Ireland is still very real. The IRA may be gone, but the struggle remains. Belfast is still a city split down the middle by a wall as figurative as it is literal. The kind of beer or whiskey they sell in a pub indicates whether it’s English or Irish. And you wouldn’t be caught dead in the wrong kind of pub.

This was already an issue when Swift was writing in the 17th century. His previous work sarcastically recommended to his people that they kill and eat their children at 12 months old, because the English were treating the Irish like animals, and so the they ought to be eaten as such. It’s sarcasm is disturbing. As are the recipes he provides in graphic detail. Explicitly pointing out the mistreatment from the English would have had him killed. And possibly eaten.

Although Gulliver’s Travels takes place in a fantasy world the concerns about oppression and human unkindness which Swift is investigating is just as tangible in Ireland today. Ultimately, it’s easy to read, wildly imaginative and causes you to think hard about humanity.

If you missed all this from Jack Black’s film, that’s not your fault.

-Tim Clarke

"Every man desires to live long, but no man wishes to be old." 

London with Charles Dickens' Great Expectations

It has often been said that Dickens would frequently take night time strolls through London, in order to get inspiration for writing. Some say it was due to his rampant insomnia… others say it was his rampant infidelity. Either way, he was one rampant guy. And his night time tramping (take it how you will) gave birth (again) to some of the greatest writing of the 19th Century.

                Great Expectations tells the story of a lovable ragamuffin, Pip, who is plucked from obscurity and given the opportunity to make something of himself in London town. As he navigates his way into being a gentleman, Pip is never sure of the identity of his wealthy benefactor. And it is Dickens’ intimate knowledge of the streets of London which make the tale come alive. The description is so vivid, you can almost taste 19th century London. He paints it not as the centre of civilisation and culture, but as something gritty, haphazard. As Pip himself says;

‘We Britons had at that time particularly settled that it was treasonable to doubt our having and our being the best of everything: otherwise, while I was scared by the immensity of London, I think I might have had some faint doubts whether it was not rather ugly, crooked, narrow, and dirty.’

The strangest thing is, it hasn’t changed much. The moment you touch down in Heathrow, and settle into the faded blue seats of a scungy Piccadilly line train to ‘Cockfosters’, you will understand. For every grand soaring marble structure, there is a homeless person underneath, singing into a traffic cone, desperate for ‘yeh spare coppers’. For every Kenneth Brannagh, there are more than enough Johnny Rottens, or sadly even some Sid’s. This is not to be disparaging of London. Or the Pistols. They’re a wonderful band and London is a wonderful place… which is still in some ways ‘ugly, crooked, narrow and dirty’. A trip down Brick Lane on a Sunday will show you the beauty amongst the grit. This jumble of villages stumbled into the 21st century, and somehow landed on its feet. Because of this, the underlying aesthetic of London, which Dickens paints on the page, still surrounds you today. So get this book, get to London, and don’t let a few extra Kit-Kat wrappers lying on the ground kill your Great Expectations.

-Tim Clarke

Basque Country with Ernest Hemingway's Fiesta:The Sun Also Rises

It is a goal of mine to one day live, at least a year, minimum, in the Basque Country. Bridging the South-West of France with the North-West of Spain, bookended by the Atlantic and the Basque and Pyrenees Mountains, it is a land of milk and honey. The architecture of Bilbao, the lanes of San Sebastian and the castle ridden cliffs of Biarritz, these are only the tip of the iceberg in a region that boasts the highest density of Michelin Star restaurants per capita of anywhere in Europe. Wine and dine honey! Oh, and did I mention that there's surf? A trip here during Sept/Oct is certain to yield some serious juice and you'll get in before the thermometer plummets.

Hemingway hints at the wave potential when he takes a bodysurf in San Sebastian near the conclusion of the novel, to wash off the fiesta. Although, it isn't until the crew of the film adaptation arrived in Biarritz in 1956 to do location shots and brought boards that the Basque's love affair with the slide began.

Seeing as how Hemingway unknowingly kick started surfing in Europe off the back of this tale, this one was a given.

Fiesta or The Sun Also Rises, traverses a whole heap of themes; like the Lost Generations' wounds of WWI (physical and psychological), the break down of morality and the brutality of love. Hemingway comes out looking pretty poor in relation to race and gender in this one too, which has provided plenty of fodder for the critics. The irony is that all these heavy themes are wrapped up in a plot that is largely just one big booze-filled romp.

It kicks off in Paris, where all the Expats have had enough of being alcoholic writers. Thinking they're due a holiday they set out on a week long bender to San Fermin, otherwise known as The Running of the Bulls. They drink and fight and drink some more and Hemingway fawns over bullfighting (He later wrote a whole book on it called Death In The Afternoon). I wont spoil the ending of this one but it involves more drinking.

The classic thing for me about this novel is that it's a good old-fashioned Roman à clef, which is French for most of this stuff really happened and I've aired my friend's dirty laundry as fiction. All his literary friends back in Paris didn't have to guess too hard as to who everyone was in the scene.

Using his distinctive hard-boiled understatement, Hemingway creates characters that we've all probably travelled with at some stage, some never again, and takes you on a tour of one of the most culturally and geographically rich areas in the world. Just ask the Basque Separatists!

What isn't said in among the dialogue is where a lot of the genius is here and this book will be your buddy on the beach after perfect sand-bottom cylinders or a raucous night bouncing through the pinxtos bars of San Sebastian, hopped up on the local cider.

Good luck matching Pappa's understated prose when recounting this trip to your amigos.

-Stu McKerihan

“Even on a hot day San Sebastian has a certain early-morning quality. The trees seem as though their leaves were never quite dry. The streets feel as though they have just been sprinkled. It is always cool and shady on certain streets on the hottest day.”

Hawaii's Oahu with Chas Smith's Welcome To Paradise, Now Go To Hell

If you don't surf then reading about the Hawaii in this book is as close as you will ever get to it. You can take an idyllic family getaway to Honolulu; play in the sand, maybe even stand up on one of the gentle rollers at Waikiki, dine at the Cheesecake Factory and you will cry hyperbole. Hell, you could even hire a Mustang convertible, dissect Oahu via the Kamehameha Highway, park near the church at Waimea Bay on the fabled North Shore and if it's winter, witness some madmen ride liquid mountains but you'd not be privy.

It's not till you paddle out at Pipe, on a real West swell, try to position yourself in one of the more competitive and life threatening line-ups in the world that you will come face-to-face with the characters and world of Hawaii that Chas Smith presents. It is searing under the surface of the Mai Tai sipping, ukulele strumming stereotype that Elvis sold our grandparents back in the 50s and that we've all kind of wanted to buy into ever since.

With a brash, Gonzo flair, Chas dives head first into the surf world underbelly of the North Shore. Intermixed with vivid depictions of his 'island dandy' outfits are insights into Hawaiian culture and the brutally managed chaos you get when you mash proud cultural tradition with a fervent band of surf misfits from around the world that descend upon a small strip of beach for a brief period over the Northern Hemisphere winter, all with an insatiable thirst for surfing glory.

With a penchant for the grittier side of surf culture, Smith captures one of the most honest portrayals of the North Shore ever written. His reluctance to stray from controversy borders on self-destructive and is probably indicative of what initially drew him to war reporting and the lawlessness of the North Shore in the first place. Ironically, his irreverent honesty also means that he finds favour with the heavyweights of the scene, providing an unusual level of access to the stories and more colourful characters that inhabit what is known as the Seven Mile Miracle.

If you're going to surf, this book is a survival guide. If the furthest you travel from your suite at the Royal Hawaiian is to do some souvenir hunting at Ala Moana shopping centre, then this will be a page turner that you can talk about with your friends when you get back to work.

The glam and the grit of Hawaii is knit together by the sardonic wit of Smith. You'll tear through this thing faster than a Keiki shorey through a tour bus load of Mid-West Mainlanders simply looking to cool off in the crystal clear waters of the Pacific.

-Stu McKerihan

“All the soldiers in the North Shore war laugh after telling their stories and none of the soldiers want their stories published. The war never ends. It restarts every winter and all of the soldiers must come back. And they will get slapped if their stories are published.”