Sally Jane Smith, Travel Author

Aging (dis)gracefully...

If only everything else could be retouched so easily 😉

#TattooTikTok #NazcaLines #NazcaPeru #PeruTattoo #TravelWriting #TravelWritersLife #AgingDisgracefully #AgeingDisgracefully

The cover of Repacking for Greece shown against the backdrop of a photo taken at Delphi. The words read “Kindle countdown deal, December 1st - 7th. £0.99 on amazon.co.uk. $0.99 on amazon.com.”]

🧿 Kindle readers: If you haven't yet picked up your copy of Repacking for Greece, now is the time 🧿

To celebrate all the good stuff going on, R4G is on a 99p (www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0645625728) / 99c (www.amazon.com/dp/0645625728) special for one week only: 1-7 December 2024. That's a 70% discount!

Lord of the Rings? Or, wait - no The Hobbit for sure.

Thank you so much for sharing these 💙 Just started planning my next trip... I'd forgotten how much work went into getting the itineraries right for these ones 😆

Packing for Greece travel series Visit Amazon's Packing for Greece travel series Page and shop for all Packing for Greece travel series books. Check out pictures, author information, and reviews of Packing for Greece travel series

Two fabulous #travel memoirs about Greece from our @journeysinpages.bsky.social
www.amazon.com/dp/B0C5HLBVK2
#welovememoirs #BooksWorthReading

POV: That time I set out to trace a map of Greece

So many fiddly little islands

So many scrunched-up balls of paper hurled across the room!

Planning a multi-stop itinerary for next year’s Greek trip and it feels a bit like that

#greeceislands #greecetravel #literarywanderlust #travelwriterslife

Thanks Val - what I would give to be back there right now!

Unpacking for Greece has won first place in the "Prose in English" category of the Greek-Australian Cultural League Book Award!

Greece is the country that turned me into a writer and helped me fall back in love with life – I never forget what a privilege it is to be welcomed by Greek readers.

A cobbled lane leads down to a blue-domed church. The sun is setting behind the church’s belltower. This photo was taken from just outside our room for the night.

Sometimes all you need is a simple snapshot of a Greek village sunset to set you up for the day.
 
Katapola, Amorgos, April 2023

A library paperback copy of the ‘The Shadow of Perseus’.

Claire Heywood’s ‘The Shadow of Perseus’ cuts through the romanticised magical realism that often obscures the brutal underbelly of Bronze Age tales. That’s not to say there isn’t magic in these pages... Review at www.goodreads.com/review/show/6073033599

@claireheywood.bsky.social

This one is on my TBR!

A collage of five screenshots. The first is from the Greece is the Word email newsletter showing a photograph by Vasileios Arsenis of a snowy Mount Olympus, a site in Greece I have yet to visit. The rest are stills of Peter and Sally chatting on a Zoom call. One of the images shows Sally holding her mother’s tiny red travel journal.

This interview with Greece is the Word touched on moments of joy and moments of vulnerability, and somehow it tapped into that indefinable something that made me fall so head over heels in love with the awe-inspiring natural and cultural landscape of #Greece.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy2_OGSZKkw

Views of a partly-ruined (but wholly-impressive) multi-story building. It has a striking portico with marbled columns and statues in niches. Two of the photographs show the façade of the building from a distance. The other two look upward from inside the portico.

Most of you know, by now, that libraries are among my favourite places. For January’s #MidMonthMapMystery, can you tell me the name & location of this one in Turkey?
 
PS: Mid-Month Map Mysteries are posted in the present tense, because that's more fun, but are based on memories of years of travel.

The book, held up in front of a blurred, waterside background. Not Hydra, unfortunately.

A Theatre for Dreamers by Polly Samson, set on Hydra, Greece

Samson, no stranger to sharing her life with other creatives, portrays the bohemian expat community of writers and other artists living on the Greek island of Hydra in the 1960s.

Review at www.goodreads.com/review/show/6046216092

An early morning photograph of Delphi, with an e-reader superimposed. The screen of the e-reader is covered in what looks like black paper, but a vertical rip in the covering shows a small section of the front cover for Repacking for Greece. The caption reads: “Coming soon, Book Two in the Packing for Greece series, Repacking for Greece, newsletter subscribers always see it first, www.sallyjanesmith.com/newsletter”

 It’s already 2024, here in Australia, and today’s the first day I can say “Repacking for Greece will land on shelves THIS year.”
 
Happy New Year to you all – and my deepest wishes for health, happiness, and peace in a world that desperately needs it.

A photo of Sally holding up three advance proof copies of ‘Unpacking for Greece’. The text reads: Greece Chats Podcast with Tony Kariotis. Now streaming Episode 59. Sally Jane Smith. Greece Media.

‘Greek Chats’ features Tony Kariotis in conversation with creatives and entrepreneurs from the Greek diaspora.

But I’m not Greek, and I'm definitely not in Tony’s league. So I’m hugely honored to be on his show.

Have a listen at www.greece-media.com/greecechats or anywhere you download podcasts.

Two photographs of Johnson's book resting against the trunk of a slim, smooth-textured tree.

What happens to shared travel, when what makes one person’s heart sing causes the other’s to fall?
 
If you enjoyed Unpacking for Greece, chances are you’ll love Aphrodite’s Breath by Susan Johnson.
 
Review at www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Two shots of a round bronze plaque set into brick pavement. There is a library book placed next to the plaque.

Two shots of a round bronze plaque set into brick pavement. There is a library book placed next to the plaque.

Yesterday, on the train to Sydney, I started Polly Samson’s A Theatre for Dreamers. It features fictionalised versions of the community of artists and writers living on Hydra in the 1960s, including Aussie writers Charmian Clift and George Johnston. So it was a lovely moment when I spotted this:

A hand holding a book in front of a pleasant waterfront backdrop. The cover is coloured orange and decorated with golden foliage. In between the flowers and leaves, there are small symbols of the story – a ship, a hand mirror, a dagger and a distaff. The book is called Daughters of Sparta and it is written by Claire Heywood.

Clytemnestra is the figure from Greek mythology who most fascinates me, so I’m looking forward to reading about her and her famous sister, Helen. I'm so privileged to have visited the three cities where these women lived: Sparta, Mycenae, Troy.
 
Do you have a favourite mythological hero / antihero?

A slide showing photos of local authors Sally Jane Smith, Fiona Lloyd, Valerie Clifford, Vivienne Lee Fraser (also writing as Lee Williamson) and Selina Fenech, The text reads: Give the gift of reading. Umina Markets. Sunday 17th December 9am-2pm.

A slide showing the cover of Unpacking for Greece, a photo of author Sally Jane Smith in Santorini, and the Umina Beach Markets logo.

Give the gift of (armchair) travel this Christmas 🎄 … or just stop by for a chat.
 
Bring along your copy of Unpacking for Greece for signing, or pick up a paperback on the day. Or just drop in to say hi to 5 local authors on Australia's NSW Central Coast, no purchase required.

Sun 17 Dec, 9am-2pm.

A photo taken from above a precipice of grey rocks speckled with orange lichen. In the valley below, there is a small, time-worn church with a tiled dome roof. From puzzling out a rudimentary map of the site, I believe this to be the church of Agios Taxiarchis, the holy archangels. If anyone knows more, or differently, I’d love to hear about it.

Hoping to complete the edits on my Aegina chapter today.

I return to my photos, again & again, to recall my sense of awe as I wandered the deserted settlement of Paleochora. Deserted, but not abandoned. Three dozen churches (of a legendary 365) still stand as testament to the care of the faithful.

Pat duly delivered <3 Thank you!

Dottie is 'mine' for the week only, a repeat dogsitting gig - I'm making the most of it. Miss her getting up with me but kinda glad she's relaxed enough this time to sleep in even though her family is away.

Please give Oscar a cuddle from me 💙

Hahahaha! 😂😂

Small black-and-white dog lying on top of a bed. Her eyes are looking up at the camera, but her head is flat on her blanket and she’s not going anywhere.

A sunrise over what appears to be a lake but is actually an inlet from the sea.

My #5amWritersClub partner has gone on strike and refuses to get out of bed. She has passive resistance down to a fine art.
 
This is the sunrise she’s missing.

A YouTube screenshot showing the book cover set against a background photograph taken in a Chinese garden. The text reads: “JourneyWoman Women’s Travel Book Club. November 2023 Book of the Month. Set in 15th-century China. Lady Tan’s Circle of Women, by Lisa See. Meet Lisa See at our last book club meeting of 2023.”

I’d never have guessed, 15 years ago when I first read Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, that one day I’d be sitting on one continent chatting with Chinese American author,
Lisa See, on another!

JourneyWoman / @tripfiction.bsky.social book club:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_EbUNNZsJ4

The cover of Unpacking for Greece with a sticker saying "Thank you Thursday. This author rocks". Under the book are the words: "Thanks for mentioning We Love Memoirs in your book! If you love reading or writing memoirs, join us!"

Having fun right now in the We Love Memoirs group on Facebook.

I am so grateful to this wonderful family of memoir readers and writers. I may never have had the confidence to publish Unpacking for Greece if it hadn't been for their support and mentorship.

www.facebook.com/groups/welovememoirs

Four photos of a building resembling a large, rusted cube standing in the middle of a field.

The design of this museum – on a site associated with one of the most enduring legends of ancient Greece – was the subject of a national contest. The winning architects were inspired by the idea of an “excavated artefact”.
 
For November’s #MidMonthMapMystery, where in Turkey am I?

The cover of Unpacking for Greece superimposed over a photograph of Santorini’s caldera. The text reads, “Holiday special: Personalise your paperback” with the website address www.SallyJaneSmith.com

Holiday special!

Until 31st Dec '23

1. Buy an Unpacking for Greece paperback as a gift (or for yourself, I won’t judge)
2. Tag me in a photo or send proof of purchase
3. DM me the recipient's name (& your own address)

For Aussies, I'll post a signed bookplate

Outside Australia, I'll email a PDF

Wonderful!