Expat - (Adventura Books) by Christina Henry de Tessan (Paperback)

About the Book

It's one thing to travel in a foreign country but it's another thing altogether to move there. In these stories, several women tell how the realities of living abroad match up to the fantasy. In accounts on food shopping in China to child rearing in India to socializing in Ireland, these women give fascinating glimpses of what it's really like to start over in a new country.

Book Synopsis

For generations, literary figures from Ernest Hemingway to Frances Mayes have fueled our fantasies about the romance of expatriate life. But it's one thing to dream about living abroad and quite another to actually do it. In Expat a diverse group of women explores in vivid detail how the reality of life abroad matches up to the fantasy. Tonya Ward Singer craves a roasted chicken in China and must buy it alive and kicking. Karen Rosenberg reevaluates both her family's Judaism and her own when invited to a Passover seder in a remote Japanese village. Mandy Dowd tries to teach the French about Thanksgiving. Emily Miller admits that in Italy she craves the Hollywood entertainment she generally deplores when on U.S. soil. Tall and fair, Meg Wirth tries hard to blend in, in Borneo--to no avail. Expat taps into the bewilderment, joys, and surprises of life overseas, where challenges often take unexpected forms and overcoming obstacles (finding Drano in Ukraine, shrimp paste in Prague) feels all the more triumphant. Featuring an astonishing range of perspectives, destinations, and circumstances, Expat offers a beautiful portrait of life abroad.

About the Author

Christina Henry de Tessan has worked in publishing in San Francisco and Seattle and as a freelance translator, editor, and book reviewer in Paris. She recently coedited A Woman Alone: Travel Tales from Around the Globe. She lives on an island outside of Seattle.