Category: Lets Go On A Trip!

Apple of My Eye

~ Wendy-Marie ~ 2 Comments

What happens when a person whose spent their entire adult life in New York City gets tapped to write a tourist guide to New York City? If you’re Helene Hanff you enlist one of your friends and take in all the sights that familiar to school children everywhere for the very first time. It might seem shocking that Helene’s never been to the Statute of Liberty but don’t judge too harshly. For example, when Blacklight and I lived in Expensive Acres I drove by certain museums every day on my way to work and it never occurred to me to visit them. Cut Helene some slack okay? It’s not like she had children and got dragged along on their school trips.

So over a span of a few months Helene and her trusty side-kick/friend Patsy explore almost all New York has to offer the tourist and native alike. Well except for the Metropolitan Museum proper, Helene still hasn’t forgiven them for grabbing part of Central Park during their 1970s expansion. It might inspire the reader to hit some of the sights on their next trip to the Big Apple. But Apple of My Eye is also a love letter and time capsule to a lost New York. All those Chock Full o’ Nuts have been replaced by Starbucks. And good luck finding a place to smoke.

 

The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street

~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Major surgery be damned. Nothing and I mean NOTHING (okay maybe an attack of nerves) is keeping Helene Hanff from her longed for trip to England. Sure little things like extensive dental work, a spanking new apartment of her own and lack of money might have kept her dreams from coming true over twenty years but this time it was Thundercats are go. Bolstered by her slight but cult classic book 84, Charing Cross Road, Helene Hanff was going to England. The England of her dreams. And for that brief trip she was the Duchess of Bloomsbury Street, fans and unseen friends smoothing her way and showing her every courtsey and nook and cranny of London. Our Helene, accustomed to writing in her alcove and visiting Central Park with her doggie friends is wined and dined and has her portrait painted. She’s the sensation when stopping at a tiny village for some milk. Everyone loves Helene.

And the reader can’t help but get swept up in the madness. You’re right there with Helene walking through the parks and as she adjusts to life in London. London has the history but there’s a sense of fear from the Londoners that Helene doesn’t have in New York. And when she gets to see her shop (the old Marks & Co shop at 84, Charing Cross Road) in person, you can’t help but feel sad, empty and thrilled at all once.

If you’ve ever been charmed by 84, Charing Cross Road and want to know what happened next, hunt down The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street. Like 84, Charing Cross Road, it’s a slight thing, easy to devour yet will stick with you. Of course if you’re Blacklight…well, I think there’s the new issue of Computer Music at Barnes & Noble…