As part of my milestone birthday celebration, my long-time book loving partner Denise planned our 10-day trip to London, which included museums, elegant afternoon teas, walking tours, rides on the double-decker buses and of course bookstores, some of which have been in business for centuries.

This is an especially challenging endeavor because one must glean through an astounding selection of books and then pick something you can haul back in your luggage.

Blackwell in Oxford

But I also needed a book about Portugal, because after London I was going to meet my daughter Cynthia (who lives in Berlin) in Lisbon for a week and admittedly I knew very little about the country. I picked up A Brief History of Portugal by Jeremy Black to help fill in the blanks.

Daunt Books in Marylebone, London

A huge skylight brightens the balcony which overlooks long oak galleries of bookcases. One wonders if it could hold one more book before it collapses. They had a good section of Portuguese literature, and I wanted something that offset the basic historical account of the Jeremy Black book. Nothing too thick also weighed in the decision mix and I ended up selecting Antonio Tabucchi’s Pereira Maintains: A Testimony (1994). Set in 1938, during the rise of fascism in Portugal (a neighbor to the Spanish Civil War) this novelette’s main character is a widower newspaper editor who must come to grips with his loneliness while being forced to make a decision on what to do against the regime.

Anticipating much book shopping, the only book I brought with me was Orwell’s Roses (2021) by Rebecca Solnit to read while in London. Beforehand,  in preparation for the trip, I read 2/3 of Peter Ackroyd’s  tome London: A Biography, which would have been much like adding a doorstopper to your carry-on. Ackroyd’s book was recently discussed at the GRSG “book club” and our complete commentary can be found here.

Pereria Maintains and Orwell’s Roses fit well together. Both Orwell and the character Pereira must find define their own paths in the fight against totalitarianism and Solnit adds her own insights on this theme as she travels to Orwell’s small farm in Wallington, Herefordshire, outside of London where Orwell and his wife lived from 1836-1940. The rural life provided inspiration when Orwell wrote Animal Farm in 1945.

Next up is Part Two of London book shopping, followed by Part Three when the road trip advances to Portugal.

Photos of the pastries, the inside of Daunt Books and Sherlock homes were taken by Denise Casey. The others by the author. Copyright 2026, Muted Horn Communications.