So Many Miles to Paradise: From Clare to There

So Many Miles to Paradise is the engaging, inspirational account of a 9 month trip around-the-world Breen and author husband Niall Williams took with their 2 kids. Excitement, joy, disappointment, wonder and fear are brought to life. Whether trapezing through a Costa Rican jungle, or toasting with 10,000 ice in Patagonia, readers join the dream and travel with them, celebrating adventure.As a New Yorker living in the remote townland of Kiltumper in County Clare for almost 20 years, Christine Breen knew it was time to start afresh. She was itching for an adventure. As an antidote to her restlessness she convinced her husband, the Irish novelist Niall Williams, (author of Four Letters of Love) to embark on a 9 month-long journey of discovery around the world with their two children, aged 11 and 15. In 2002—as the author neared her 50th birthday—she and Niall and their kids began the adventure in New York on the eve of the first anniversary of 9/11. From their comfortable home in the west of Ireland their trip took them to the beaches of the eastern seaboard of the US, to the far reaches of the forests of the Pacific Northwest, on then to California, Costa Rica, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, New Zealand islands, Australia, the Far East and Europe, ending with a mishap, the last of several, in the South of France. Among the usual cock-ups with accommodation, the interminable hassle with customs, Bolivian Belly, and the occasional lost luggage there are some genuinely hairy moments. Like the time they found themselves as passengers on a small boat adrift on Lake Titicaca with a drunken boatman and a squall blowing in. Or when they were stuck in Bali when the first bird flu cases were reported in China and their trip to Shanghai threatened. Breen writes about her children’s reactions to new from the blue pools of Yellowstone, to the 3-fingered tree-sloths, orange land crabs, Jesus Christ lizards in the Costa Rican jungle, to the floating villages on Lake Titicaca. And all the while her novelist husband is writing his fourth novel, Only Say the Word. So Many Miles to Paradise is Christine’s engaging and inspirational account of this journey, the like of which most of us will only dream about. Excitement, joy, disappointment, wonder and fear are intensified. Questions are asked and answered about the pros and cons of travelling with children and what’s it like to live 24/7 for 9 months as a family of 4 through the highs and lows of life. Whether to take vaccinations? And where does a vegetarian 15 year old eat in South America? Whether trapezing through a Costa Rican jungle, celebrating Christmas on a farm in Chile, or toasting life and family with a glassful of 10,000-year-old ice in Patagonia, Christine’s travelogue reminds readers that some risks are worth taking.