Greenland, Stand with WGA, Coronation Recipes, Book Souvenirs & More: Endnotes 05 May

Every Friday, we celebrate the weekend — and all the reading and relaxing and daydreaming time ahead — with Melissa's favorite book- and travel-related links of the week. Why work when you can read fun stuff?!

This post is part of our Endnotes series.

Those colorful houses are located in Narsaq, a small town in southern Greenland known for fishing and farming (say hi to the sheep!) — and surrounded by brilliant blue waters swimming with whales, seals, and icebergs. The local ice is used to brew Pilsner-style beer and vodka made with iceberg water that’s thousands of years old. This 5-minute video tour is packed with gorgeous scenery, an ice-and-rock beach, fishing, and a very strong sense of place.

• We 100% stand with the 12,000 members of The Writers Guild of America (WGA) who are currently on strike. If you’re wondering what it’s all about, here’s a solid explainer. And here’s an easy way to donate to support the strikers.

• Please Eat in the Library. ‘In cities from Helsinki, Finland, to Canberra, Australia… are stocked with cafés and wine bars (yes, really!) that encourage lingering with a culinary experience all their own. Think: chickpea bánh mì, wild mushroom soup made from sheathed woodtufts foraged in a nearby forest, and cask Côtes du Rhône on tap.’

• Would love to try the bread from one of Sri Lanka’s musical, mobile bakeries. (And if you haven’t listened to our recent podcast episode Sri Lanka: Remarkable, Relentless, Resplendent).

• Charming bookish time-travel adventures: Travelling Modern Europe with a Victorian Railway Guidebook. The photos will make you nostalgic for places you’ve never been.

• Very excited to watch this. Hannah Waddingham as a gorgeous villain? Yes, please.

• Well, this is adorable. Turtle Bread is a graphic novel about ‘baking, fitting in, and the power of friendship.’ This interview with the author Kim-Joy is a delight.

• I agree very strongly with the ideas in this piece about why used books make the best travel souvenirs. ‘[F]or me, the true treasures are buried in the funky, sometimes-musty secondhand shops, where a great find is like kismet. These books have lived entire lives, probably right there in town, before having a chance encounter with your visiting self. And you get to bring home that unseen history along with whatever is written on the pages.’ (ht Read More Books)

• This list of twenty-first-century wellness trends that were also hardships Jane Eyre suffered at Lowood School from McSweeney’s made me laugh.

• For your Coronation celebration needs: Perfect Coronation recipes from Country Life and all the details you need to know about Charles III’s Coronation. For example, the ceremony has 6 parts: the recognition, the oath, the anointing, the investiture (‘when the Archbishop will place the extremely heavy St Edward’s Crown’ on Charles’ head), the enthronement, and homage, when the King will leave the Coronation Chair and move to the throne. (Let our recent podcast episode London: The Tower, Tudors, and a Nice Cuppa Tea get you in the mood.)

• Sorta related: The English Breakfast Society. Click through for more dazzling breakfast platters.

• In our podcast episode Lebanon: Surrender to the Call of the Mijwiz, Dave shared the story of a ‘spite house’ in Beirut. Turns out, there are a handful of spite houses in New England, too.

• This interview with audiobook narrator Julia Whelan is filled with interesting tidbits. I loved the description of how she prepares to record a book. (She’s recorded more than 500 audiobooks including smash hits like Gone Girl, The Great Alone, and The Invisible Life of Addie La Rue.)

• Reading lists to blow up your TBR: 7 novels that celebrate pop music, 10 great stories of female adventurers, and modern Gothic explained in 10 books.

New Episode of The Library of Lost Time

In each mini-podcast episode, we discuss two books at the top of our TBR, then share a fun book- or travel-related distraction. Get all the episodes and books galore here.

In this episode, we get excited about two books: Dinner Party by Sarah Gilmartin and You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith. Then Dave tells the tale of remarkable women involved in the London’s criminal underworld. [transcript]

Links

• Maggie Smith’s website and Twitter.

• Legal Design Podcast: Fighting Crime by Design with Lorraine Gamman.

• Wikipedia: Shirley Pitts.

• Wikipedia: Alice Diamond.

• Gone Shopping: The Story of Shirley Pitts, Queen of Thieves by Lorraine Gamman

• The Guardian: Girl Gang’s Grip on London Underworld Revealed.

• Criminal Secret Society: The Story of Forty Elephants.

• Video: Diamond Annie and the Forty Elephants — The All-Female Gang That Terrorized London.

May you find your perfect gang/found family.

Top image courtesy of LouieLea/Shutterstock.