Wednesday, the 30th of June, and time for Shelf Control once again! Shelf Control is a weekly feature hosted by Lisa at Bookshelf Fantasies, and celebrates the books waiting to be read on your TBR piles/mountains. To participate, all you do is pick a book from your TBR pile, and write a post about it–what its about, why you want to read it, when you got it, and such. If you participate, don’t forget to link back to Lisa’s page, and do also leave your links in the comments below as I’d love to check out your picks as well!
This week, I’m back with a shelf control post after an unplanned break these last few weeks. This time, my pick is the first of two of the offerings for World Book Day this year that I picked up (I was very well behaved this time and only picked two 😛 )–The Strange Journey of Alice Pendelbury (2011) by Marc Levy. This was first published in French as L’etrange voyage de Monsieur Daldry; the version I have is an English translation by Chris Murray.
Alice Pendelbury, a creator of perfumes, is leading a fairly good and orderly life, she has a great career, good friends. On Christmas Eve in 1950, on an outing with friends to Brighton, a fortune teller predicts that she must undertake a long journey and meet six people, before she can meet an important man in her life (one who was in fact walking behind her a few moments ago). Alice is disturbed by this revelation, and even begins to have nightmares. Then her so far not-very-friendly neighbour, Mr Daldry encourages her to take the predictions seriously and actually set out on the journey. And the eccentric man even offers to accompany her! Thus begins Alice’s adventure in which she begins to question her past, and which shapes her future in unimaginable ways.
This sounds like a rather unusual read–in fact, the description sort of reminded me of that film (I had to look up the name because I couldn’t remember), Only You in which Faith (Marisa Tomei) flies off to Venice with her sister-in-law, just days before her wedding, on the trail of ‘Damon Bradley’ someone a fortune teller had mentioned to her (in that case the fortune telling was a prank though). But I remember it being good fun, and which was why I thought this one might be too.
But once again, getting back on track here–this story involves a journey to Europe (though some descriptions mention Turkey) in the 1950s which makes it something I would definitely want to read. I love the idea of the setting in Turkey especially since I have had the chance to travel there (at least to Istanbul) before. Reviews are a bit mixed on the book but I would still like to give it a try.
Have you read this one or any other title by Marc Levy? Did you like it/them? Any recommendations of books that are like this one? Looking forward to your thoughts and recommendations!
Cover image and description from Goodreads as always (also here).
Find Lisa’s pick this week, Resistance is Futile by Jenny T. Colgan, with mathematicians and code breaking, here.
Literary Potpourri 
How interesting that the translated title changed the character who’s named in it. I wonder why they did that? It completely changes the expectation as to who the novel focuses on. I’m intrigued!
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Yes, that was interesting to note; let’s see one finds out why on reading the book.
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This sounds really good! I’ve seen books by Marc Levy pop up on recommendations list, but I’ve never read any of his books. I’ll be interested to see what you think of it!
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I hope to get to it sometime soon.
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Sounds like an interesting read! I love this kinda story concept.
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Let’s see if it turns out as good as it sounds.
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