The Broken Road: From the Iron Gates to Mount Athos
Patrick Leigh Fermor (2013)

THE A5 BOOK REVIEW

The Broken Road is the final book in a three volume travel writing series covering Patrick Leigh Fermor’s journey in 1933-1934 as an eighteen year old traveling by foot from Holland to Constantinople. Leigh Fermor was unable to complete this long-awaited final book, and so The Broken Road was assembled from his almost completed manuscripts by biographer Artemis Cooper and travel writer Colin Thubron.  Like the first two, the book is a joy to read, with funny descriptions of wild nights with shepherds and Greek fishermen, and beautiful descriptions of landscapes and countrysides.  The last part of the journey takes Leigh Fermor through Bulgaria and Romania, ending in Greece, where he ended up later living. 
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OTHER A5 RECOMMENDED TRAVEL BOOKS - PATRICK LEIGH FERMOR

Patrick Leigh Fermor (1915-2011) was a British travel writer, scholar, and soldier, once described by a BBC journalist as a blend of Indiana Jones, James Bond, and Graham Greene.  He is probably most famous for his trilogy of books describing his journey in 1993 on foot across Europe as an eighteen-year-old, and for his experience fighting in Greece in World War II.  His work influenced many future writers.  To learn more about Patrick Leigh Fermor, click here.
book cover of A Time of Gifts
#1 in the trilogy
book cover of Between the Woods and the Water
#2 in the trilogy

GREAT QUOTES:

“But on his death in 2011 he left behind a manuscript of the final narrative whose shortcomings or elusiveness had tormented him for so many years.  He never completed it as he would have wished.  The reasons for this are uncertain.  The problem remained obscure even to him, and The Broken Road is only its partial resolution.  The book's fascination resides not only in the near-conclusion of its youthful epic, but on the light that it throws on the creative process of this brilliant and very private man."
- introduction to The Broken Road

INTERESTING LINKS:

  • The story of how this final version of the trilogy was published is very interesting.  Read the New York Times article on Patrick Leigh Fermor's book, or read about the history in an article in 2011 from the Guardian, 
  • Hear directly from the publisher on how they decided to create the cover that ties in with the series, especially given that the creator of the first two covers had died a few years earlier.