Hard Place to Leave

Intrepid and empathetic, gifted with the dispassionate gaze of a born observera harmonious collage of worldview and character, a wunderkammer of experiences in a life fully lived. Melissa Febos, The New York Times Winner of the 2023 Lowell Thomas AwardDeSanctis encounters spies and love interests, but its herlushly polished writing that makes this book a joy to read. The WashingtonPostVogue's Best Books of 2022The Washington Posts Best Travel Books of 2022Restless to leave, eager to return: this memoir in essays captures the unrelenting pull between the past and the present, between traveling the world and staying home.Starting in a dreary Moscow hotel room in 1983, weaving back and forth to rural New England,and ending on a West Texas trail in 2020,Marcia DeSanctis tells stories that span the globe and half a lifetime. With intimacy and depth, over quicksand in France, insomnia in Cambodia, up a volcano in Rwanda, spinning through the eye of a snowstorm in Bismarck, and atop a dumpster in her own backyard, thisNew York Timesbestselling author, award-winning essayist and journalist forVogueandTravel + Leisureimmerses us in places waiting to be experienced and some that may be more than were up for. She encounters spies, angels, leopards, shoes, the odd rattlesnake, a random head of state, and many times over, the ghosts of her past. Each subsequent voyage leads to revelations about her search for solitude, a capacity for adventure, and always, a longing for home.