Book Review: Bill Bryson "Down Under"

I was on a flight from Houston to Washington via Dallas today. We seemed to sit forever on the tarmac in Dallas, in fact just over 1.5 hours from leaving gate to taking off. It was amazingly silly. The captain warened us that if he had to stop and restart the engines one more time, we’d have had to return to the terminal for more fuel. And we hadn’t even left.

What was worse was that when we got near Washington, there was a storm ahead, and he then explained to us that normally he’d fly around it but we didn’t have enough fuel to do that. So he was left with a choice of a bumpy ride through the storm, or we weren’t going to Washington that night. Not a great choice. He decided to push on to Washington because he thought it shouldn’t be too bad. I hate the fact that he was left with that decision.

Time to read

However, the good thing was that I finished reading Down Under by Bill Bryson .

I’m a real fan of Bill’s writing and this book is no exception. It provides a wonderful and very funny summary of his trips throughout a good chunk of Australia.

Bill has a way of providing insights that is sorely lacking in most authors. I found myself laughing out loud many times while reading it. I also enjoyed the extra chapter at the end about his time growing up in the U.S. in the 1950s.

Summary

What can I say? Highly recommended!

9 out of 10

2008-03-31