Monday, October 27, 2014

Review- Impressions of Egypt by Douglas Misquita

Goodreads Summary:

In November of 2010 I spent a little over a week in Egypt. I was fascinated and humbled by the history and culture of the country.
This book isn't a picture-book; there are far better pictures available on the internet and in travel magazines than the thousand plus I clicked with my point-and-shoot.
This book is all about the impressions, emotions and implications that no picture can convey, but something that can only be experienced when you bask in the glorious Mediterranean sun in Alexandria, are belittled by the sentinel pyramids at Giza, come to terms with the engineering feat of relocating Abu Simbel, appreciate the historic grandeur of the museum-city of Luxor, or relive the romance of the Nile as you drift past gently-swaying date palms and white-sailed feluccas. 


REVIEW:

*NOTE: We (The Readdicts) received a copy of Impressions of Egypt by Douglas Misquita from the author in exchange for an honest review. We thank Douglas for the book!

Author Douglas Misquita's Impressions of Egypt is a tiny collection of memories the author has shared with his readers in the form of a small book from his short travel to Egypt. Like the author, and probably like most others, I have also been fascinated by Egypt for a long time now. Studying about the country in Geography class in school, playing games based on some Egyptian aspect or the other and then coming across Egyptian references in books all added in making me really curious about Egypt. That's the main reason why I was looking forward to the book, and the best part about it, for me, was that it's an extremely quick read that I devoured in an hour. 

Because Impressions of Egypt is Douglas' own experiences put into words, I must say that the author has described everything really nicely. The writing was easy to read and simple to follow. It was difficult to imagine everything that was described- and I'm sure Douglas will agree with me here- as I know it must really be difficult to capture the beauty of Egypt. I quite like this one particular line used by the author in the very beginning of the book: 


"I suddenly realise the English vocabulary is extremely limited: It cannot convey my experience [...]" 

At the same time, however, I cannot deny the fact that for me, as a reader, it was the closest I could come in touch with Egypt and it was great to try see it with the help of this book. 

Impressions of Egypt is a great collection of Douglas' travel experiences and he has done a very nice job of sharing the same with his readers. I liked reading the book and for a such a short read, it was almost like a travelogue and was packed with lots of facts and information that I will definitely retain. 

RATING:



2 comments:

  1. You know, I don't like realistic fiction or anything like that, but I do love my cook books and travel books so this is probably something I'd totally want to at least peek at. I'm glad for a quick read ;) And yay for great descriptive writing as well. I'm glad you enjoyed this as a whole and I hope you get to visit Egypt yourself one day :) Thanks for sharing, Sarika!

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  2. Ohhh I do love reading about Egyptian history and whatnot. I can only hope I could visit there one day! But well, it's pretty unlikely so this book would be a good substitute.

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