Express Media – We're here for young writers

The things we know about Cuba: cigars, mojitos, salsa. Fidel - formerly in combat gear, now in an Adidas tracksuit. Hooked up to an IV unit. What else? World class doctors. Highest rate of literacy in Latin America. What do we know as writers, as readers? Cuba occupies a hugely important place in Latin American literature. The writings of José Marti inspired a lasting revolution, the baroque writings of José Lezama Lima captured the enchantment of a Carribean island with mixed heritage, and the early works of Alejo Carpentier are arguably the source of Magic Realism and the precursor to the Boom which saw writers such as Gabriel García Márquez, Julio Cortázar, Mario Vargas Llosa and Carlos Fuentes become internationally renowned.

The Voiceworks demographic, that is all you peeps under 25, is generally also the demographic that picks up and goes overseas for long stretches at a time. I just bought a ticket to Europe myself! So I've been thinking about reading materials to take overseas and thinking about how you decide what to read. The last time I went overseas was a few years ago and one of the books I happened to pick up in Thailand was Robert Jordan's The Eye of The World, which is the first book in his Wheel of Time series. Yes, I admit it, I love a long, involved, super-detailed fantasy series. And I was so excited to find out that the Wheel of Time series goes for 12 books! (Actually, Robert Jordan died while writing the 12th, Brandon Sanderson has taken over the helm and is extending the series to 14 books.) These books became my perfect travelling companions, they are rollicking adventures stories and they are long! And due to their popularity, I was able to find the next book in the series pretty much every time I perused a second-hand book stall. This year, I'm thinking of travel books a little differently. Inspired by Estelle over at 3000books who wrote about reading Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family while travelling in Sri Lanka, I'm now thinking why don't I read fiction that is set in the places I'm to visit? So I went to Camberwell Market and picked up Dead Europe by Christos Tsiolkas. But now I'm looking for books set in England, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and the Czech Republic. I'm also interested in what you've read while travelling and what you would or would not recommend?