A propos de l'auteur
Œuvres de Andrew Eames
The 8:55 to Baghdad: From London to Iraq on the Trail of Agatha Christie and the Orient Express (2004) 272 exemplaires
Benn's London: Everyone's London, Culture, Leisure, Trading and Shopping, Pads and Palaces, Rural London, the River (1998) 3 exemplaires
Destination London 1 exemplaire
Oeuvres associées
Étiqueté
Partage des connaissances
- Date de naissance
- 1958
- Sexe
- male
- Nationalité
- UK
UK - Lieux de résidence
- London, England, UK
- Études
- University of Cambridge
- Professions
- journalist
travel writer
editor - Courte biographie
- The grandson of a Scottish crofter from the Isle of Skye, with a father from the Channel Island of Guernsey, Andrew Eames was born with his hand luggage packed.
After completing a BA in English at the University of Cambridge, he disappeared off to the Far East in 1980, travelling until his money ran out. In Singapore, he started working for the Straits Times, before returning to the UK and moving into business-to-business magazines, rising eventually to edit the likes of Frontier and Business Traveller. After a stint on the Home and Foreign news desks of The Times, he moved into guidebook publishing, as managing editor of Insight Guides. He eventually went freelance some 18 years ago, and is still making ends meet, despite the whole wife-children-mortgage disaster. Frankly, the guy deserves a medal.
Membres
Critiques
In 2002 Eames embarked on a (mostly) train journey from London, England to Iraq to follow in the footsteps of mystery author Agatha Christie. It is a beyond brilliant idea for Eames is able to weave together a travelogue of his own experiences, historical snapshots of the regions he traverses and an abbreviated biography of one of the world's best known crime writers of the century. Eames's journey takes him through Belgium, France, Switzerland, Slovenia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Turkey and Syria; ending in Damascus on the eve of the Gulf War.… (plus d'informations)
A nice idea, combining travel writing with a minibiography of Agatha Christie. Shame it drags on too long.
Andrew Eames retraces the steps of Patrick Leigh Fermor, and wrote “Blue River, Black Sea” (2009), his account of his trip from the source of the Danube all the way to the Black Sea, and including a journey away from the river in Romania. Mr. Eames’ book covers a lot of ground, literally, but it gets stuck somewhat in descriptions, and lacks a little on personal contacts. Even where he meets people, whether shepherds or princes, the interaction sometimes lacks depth. Still, a nice enough read, and an easy one.… (plus d'informations)
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Statistiques
- Œuvres
- 15
- Aussi par
- 2
- Membres
- 454
- Popularité
- #54,064
- Évaluation
- 3.5
- Critiques
- 17
- ISBN
- 52
- Langues
- 4
This book's concept started out as a "let's follow Agatha Christie's journeys to the middle east by train" story, but morphed into part travelogue, part history lesson and part Christie autobiography.
Eames attempts to do a trip between England and Baghdad, previously done several times and almost completely by train by Agatha Christie (and much on the Orient Express). This book is the result of when Eames tries to recreate this trip. The Orient Express, as was, was shut down in the 1970s, and has been recreated in part by some willing investors who, as a labour of love, have gathered the remaining rolling stock and put on some level of service. Lack of rolling stock, multiple local and global wars, and shifting borders (and that England is no longer a regional strong man in the area) has meant that such a trip undertaken by a solo Englisher is no longer really possible.[return][return]However, Eames does as he can, describing his various adventures through Europe and the Middle-east, and some of the more interesting people he meets. He goes through what remains of Yugoslavia, and finds out how some people are coping 10 years after the war that split the country in three.
His attempts to reach Baghdad on a bus with a motley crew of Westerners is tense, where noone really knows who is who, the English continue to have a stiff upper lipped colonial approach to travel, the Americans can be dodgy and everyone is trying to guess who the CIA agent is. This part of the trip reflects the tension and conflicting views of the potentially coming war. Eames� journey concluded on a bitter sweet note in Baghdad in 2003, with post-9/11 tensions running high and the Allied airplanes beginning to do bombing sorties in the skies. [return][return]At the end of the book is a �more straight� version of Christie�s trips in the Middle-East in her guise as the wife of an archaeologist and her continuing work as a worldwide known writer � several of her books, including �death in Mesopotamia� and �Murder on the Orient Express� were written during her second marriage.… (plus d'informations)