HOBNOBBING WITH GHOSTS II: A LYRIC AND LITERATURE JUNKIE TRAVELS THE WORLD

Hobnobbing for Ghosts II: A Lyric and Literature Junkie Travels the World is a collection of travel articles mostly written over the past decade by veteran journalist, author and travel writer Steve Bergsman.


The focus of the stories is not so much a straight forward what to do or where to go. Rather, the details are a lighthearted attempt to explain why you would want to go to a place like Muscle Shoals, Alabama, or sail down the Mekong River in Southeast Asia – all based on who had preceded you there or what historical incident took place there or what cultural collective arose out of that location.


For example, serious tourists might not put Wilkesboro, North Carolina, on their places-to-go list, but the small town boasts a unique history. In one of the odd, post-Civil War, romantic-tragedies, a man named Tom Dula killed another person and was hanged. The story became a ballad, which was picked up by folksingers The Kingston Trio, in the 1950s, and became the Number One song in the country. The jail where “Tom Dooley” was held before execution is an actual place and still can be visited. Or, on the international front, the tiny European country of Andorra has transformed itself in one large shopping mall, but in its old incarnation, songs, books, plays were written about this pretty spot in the Pyrenees.


Motion pictures are part of our collective memory, which is why the James Bond thriller Dr. No evolved from Port Antonio, Jamaica; the John Ford classic The Quiet Man is fondly recalled in Cong, Ireland; The Wave comes to mind when visiting Flam, Norway; and the original cinematic treasure about the Mekong River is the Hedy Lamarr-Robert Taylor romance, Lady of the Tropics.


This type of essay about a cultural journey has been called literary travel, but Steve Bergsman, in his second volume of articles, pivots slightly spending many a night in towns and cities where composers and rock stars hung their hat, and wrote compositions such as “In The Hall of the Mountain King” or pop magic like “Take It Easy.”


Hobnobbing With Ghosts II is a wild, informative and fun ride, so buckle up and go see what America and world has to offer even if you never leave your comfy-chair.