St. Lucia, Peter Rabbit, Roadside Attractions, Book Dresses & More: Endnotes 02 June

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 two (dormant) volcanic spires above are The Pitons in St. Lucia, in the eastern Caribbean Sea. If you’re feeling motivated during your idyllic vacation, you can hike on Gros Piton, the taller of the two — or enjoy a leisurely catamaran cruise at sunset to enjoy the dramatic view from the sea. The Pitons were designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2004. They’re a wonderland of exotic plants and animals — and more than 60% of the marine area is covered by coral reefs. Here’s an excellent video of the hiking trail and a local restaurant.

• Psychology Today asks the crucial question: Can I be friends with people who don’t read books?

• Have fun perusing the the 10 most unusual items in the collection of The British Library.

• For five years, Susan Straight read books set across the United States. Here’s her library of America.

• Once upon a time, you could stay at the world’s most beautiful hotel — so why was it demolished?

• Fun travel activities for summer! Here are 10 easy-to-enter running races across the US and the best wild swimming in world cities. (Dublin’s Forty Foot looks like a sweet spot to cool off.) And soon, you can swim in the Seine in Paris!

• I relate to this so strongly: When I am anxious or sad, I reach for Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall.

• This space alphabet is sweet, pastel-colored, mid-century eye candy.

• I recommended the classic thriller The Lady Vanishes by Ethel Lina White in our podcast episode about trains. This discussion of the book at CrimeReads is great — and now I want to read more of White’s books.

• Related: 16 of the Best British Railway Mystery Novels & Series.

• This is an eye-opening look at the origins of Beatrix Potter’s animal stories. ‘While rereading another collection of children’s stories featuring the trickster hero Brer Rabbit – for my own book on how these folktales were introduced to North America by enslaved Africans – it became clear to me that the similarities between Beatrix Potter’s tales and the Brer Rabbit stories demand further consideration.’

• Every week, The American Scholar shares’ poems read aloud, beautifully.’ Treat yourself to The Call by Charlotte Mew.

• If this isn’t irresistible to you, I don’t know what to say: A List of Historic, Weird, and Totally Fascinating Places to Stop on a Road Trip Across the US. ‘[C]harming little spots in between the marquee destinations can be the hardest to sniff out. We’re talking about the retro soda fountains; the dusty saloons; the fruit stand with emus out back.’

• Last week, I shared details about the Vermeer exhibit at Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum. If you want to go even deeper with the artist, I recommend the website Essential Vermeer. It features in-depth discussions of every painting, his technique, his life, and upcoming events.

• Libraries (and librarians) really are the best. Between the stacks: A day in the life of a library. ‘Without libraries, you can’t pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Without libraries, you may not be able to access government services, scholarship applications. We need to just remember that libraries are really essential to the functioning of our economy, our democracy, our very lives.’

• We have been known to plan our vacation itineraries around trying a specific sandwich. I want to try all of the ones mentioned in this Highly Opinionated Guide to Atlanta’s 10 Best Sandwiches.

• If you love to read about spooky houses like I love to read about spooky houses, you need this list of 6 thrillers with houses hiding a sinister past. And you might want to take this quiz: design a dark castle to find out which gothic literature character matches your energy. I got ‘ghostly spirit.’

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: The Tumbling Girl by Bridget Walsh and The West: A New History in Fourteen Lives by Naoíse Mac Sweeney. Then Mel shares the highlights of the first Pulitzer Prize winners. [transcript]

Links

• Visit the Pulitzer Prize website and see all the winners organized by year.

• Dive into Herbert Bayard Swope’s Wikipedia page, and this article about his gambling hobby.

• See photos of his mansion on Long Island here and here.

• Here’s Julia Ward Howe’s Wikipedia page.

• Josef Pulitzer and the Crowdfunding Campaign That Saved the Statue of Liberty.

• SSoP Podcast Episode 27 — Newsroom: From Clacking Typewriters to Viral Video.

• An American Childhood by Annie Dillard

• Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators by Ronan Farrow

• The Crofter and the Laird by John McPhee

• Less: A Novel by Andrew Sean Greer

• Middlesex: A Novel by Jeffrey Eugenides

• The Shipping News: A Novel by Annie Proulx

• So Big by Edna Ferber

Wishing you a comfy spot for reading and an unputdownable book.

Top image courtesy of Delray Beach Photog/Shutterstock.