Galley Letter

January 2003

Dear Editor:

Shop the black market in Cuba. Tread the war-torn border between Lebanon and Israel. Fall in love—with an inmate incarcerated in a Costa Rican prison. Sounds like a travel brochure—for a tour led by Dante Alighieri.

This is not a description of Inferno, but the actual travel memoir of twenty-five-year-old Wendy Dale, whose escape from the corporate doldrums means a trip to some of world’s least desirable spots. AVOIDING PRISON AND OTHER NOBLE VACATION GOALS (Three Rivers Press, June 2003) begins with Dale working as a writer in the aerospace industry, whose mind-numbing job seems to consist primarily of publicizing what will be on the menu the next day in the employee cafeteria. Then, she hops on a plane to visit her parents, who have sold everything they own ("basically the house, the car, and anything else that could be considered their children’s future inheritance") and moved to Honduras with no jobs and no plans for the future.

Dale’s innocent family visit explodes into an around-the-world adventure to some of the world’s most dangerous places. Her journey begins with a hair-raising (and legally dubious) trip to Beirut to visit her journalist friend Peter, whose favorite activity seems to be dodging bombs. ("The good news, as I would learn later, was that they were ‘small bombs.’") In Cuba, Dale searches for contraband cigars and rum, attempts to learn how to salsa, and struggles to rendezvous with a Cuban man who cannot legally enter her hotel room. Finally, she winds up in Costa Rica for what she thought was a harmless trip, until she falls in love with a man imprisoned there for a crime he didn’t commit.

The story of one woman’s journey off the beaten track, AVOIDING PRISON AND OTHER NOBLE VACATION GOALS is edgy, honest, and utterly hilarious. It’s a bumpy and unforgettable ride in which Dale discovers that a successful vacation—much like that elusive thing happiness—can be found in some of the most unlikely places imaginable.

Please enjoy the enclosed galley, and I look forward to hearing from you regarding your interest.
Cheers,

Melissa Kaplan
Three Rivers Press
212.572.2098