Bill Bryson

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Any fans here of the travel writer/English language scholar Bill Bryson?

If so, what's your favorite of his books?

Mine: Neither Here Nor There.

[lemuralley]

I adored In a Sunburned Country, and very much enjoyed A Walk in the Woods. I couldn't really get into The Mother Tongue, especially after reading that it wasn't terribly accurate. I generally like his writing though, so I think I was just in a "I don't feel like reading" mood when I took that out of the library.

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lemuralley said:

I adored I couldn't really get into The Mother Tongue, especially after reading that it wasn't terribly accurate. I generally like his writing though, so I think I was just in a "I don't feel like reading" mood when I took that out of the library.

I generally have a hard time slogging through scholarly works, but I found The Mother Tongue easier than most simply because Bryson is funny as hell, regardless of the subject.

I kind of dragged through A Walk in the Woods. It was not one of my favorites, but reading about Katz (who first appeared in Neither Here Nor There) was interesting.

[Deleted]

I loved In a Sunburned Country! I was in tears reading about his jet lag-induced unconsciousness in the back seat of his friend's car. I didn't care for his book on I'm a Stranger Here Myself. I thought it was a little mean-spirited, but maybe I was being too sensitive.

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unironical said:

I didn't care for his book on I'm a Stranger Here Myself. I thought it was a little mean-spirited, but maybe I was being too sensitive.

That's one I haven't read yet. Have you read any of Paul Theroux's books? Talk about mean-spirited! Fascinating reading, but it didn't make me want to spend any time socializing with Theroux. Although Bryson can be cranky, he seems more like a person who would be fun to hang around with.

The Lost Continent, Bryson's first travel book, is funny and enjoyable reading, but the overall mood is darker than his other works. There are lots of reminiscences of his childhood travels with his family and his relationship with his father (the book was written right after his father died), and these often take a gloomy turn. He later said in a televised book book-signing talk that he was going through a rough emotional time when he wrote that one.

[marywebgirl]

Loved In a Sunburned Country, and I really liked The Lost Continent, too. I read the former while on my honeymoon in Oz, and the latter when I hadn't lived in the Midwest for several years, so reading a book that talked about it with a lot of love was nice.

It took me months to get through A Short History of Nearly Everything. He discussed pretty complicated subjects, and then he'd make jokes about it being over his head. It was both dense and annoying after a while.

[Ripley]

I'm another one who loved In a Sunburned Country. I think I need to re-read it. I also loved Notes From a Small Island.

[Sunnyhorse]

pianoforte said:

That's one I haven't read yet. Have you read any of Paul Theroux's books? Talk about mean-spirited! Fascinating reading, but it didn't make me want to spend any time socializing with Theroux.

OT, but you can find my rant about Theroux's The Kingdom by the Sea in the Books You've Thrown Away thread. Guy seems like a total asshole.

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sunnyhorse said:

OT, but you can find my rant about Theroux's The Kingdom by the Sea in the Books You've Thrown Away thread. Guy seems like a total asshole.

Theroux is the kind of guy who would hire a prostitute and then give her shit for being a prostitute.

[tszuj]

I love him! His book on Britain is one of the best British travel books (and it's kind of an anthropological gide, too) I've ever read.