Hester Monday, a successful middle-class woman working for a travel company called inspiringly ´Paradise Awaits´, is requested to take care of Jake Oakenfield, who went through an unpleasant accident and instead of returning to New York is stuck into a hotel room until feeling better. It is a luxury hotel room and he can order gourmet room service any way, but what about something else. Like, virtual travel...
To be honest, if someone would have explain the concept two years ago I would dismiss this person for ever out of my life. Travel from the comfort of your couch? The world may be end soon...But then, the pandemic came and instead of planning trips and counting new countries, I´ve started to get interested in home design and fancy furniture and complex recipes. Like us, all...But to be fully honest, there is something fascinating about virtual travel. Recently, I´ve been on an Oculus ride to Dubai and Tokyo and Petra and the experience was, at a great extent beyond my expectations as I was brought close to details and corners impossible to be reached with human strength. It will never replace a real time travel experience but it extends and diversify the experience in itself. Hester though, is delighted by such encounters because, although active in the field of travel she is not necessarily a travel addict. Not by plain, anyway. There is a trauma she is dealing with for years, therefore, the virtual side of travel is for her largely fulfilling.
The Staycation by Cressida McLaughlin is a pleasant read, in the same way a virtual travel experience can supply the longing for wanderlust. It is a curious meeting between two middle class professional people who happens to share some common interest and to meet at the right place although not necessarily during a the good time.
Although Jake and Hester, predictably, are expected to feel for each other, sooner or later, there is no romance - but neither hate - between the two and one need a lot of hard work of persuasion to seriously consider that actually may happen between the two. I was not too convinced that there is a match between the two, but love and relationships are always a matter of taste - therefore beyond good and evil evaluations.
What I really appreciated in terms of interaction between the characters is their (positive) empathic, emotional connection and receptivity. It is one of the most precious details of the book and it takes definitely a lot of creative and writing skills to make it happen.
The Staycation is a recommended read for anyone looking for travel off the beaten path of imagination, a path leading in the end to romance and some real time and space travel.
The cover adds to the joyous feeling of new that defines largely this book - new love, new life, new travel adventures - both in terms of the choice of colours and visual conceptualization of the story.
Rating: 3.5 stars
Disclaimer: Book offered as part of the book tour, but the opinions are, as usual, my own
Thanks for the blog tour support x
ReplyDeleteThank you!
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