Traveling Circus

Charlie and his family are about to embark on another trip, to another out-of-the-way place off the beaten path. This time they are heading to an island in Croatia, a country Charlie has never even heard of. An incredibly beautiful country that lives in the shadow of war and conflict.

Even for a seasoned traveler like Charlie, Croatia is a very different experience. To travel in a country where the language is completely unfamiliar and half the words have no vowels. To visit remote villages where the Internet is so slow, you might as well not have it at all. Where goats are a traffic-calming device, red cliffs loom like fortresses over an impossibly blue sea, and luggage porters are a line of women pushing wheelbarrows.

Still, Charlie and his little brother, Max, manage to find adventure wherever they go. There’s cliff diving, pigs on spits, hair-raising ferry crossings and snake juice for breakfast (“Breakfast in Croatia — at your own risk!”). And there’s a sober side to their adventures this time, too. A friend who was sentenced to Croatia’s version of Alcatraz, despite committing no crime. An unsettling encounter with the Hermit of Vrgada. The sight of a half-destroyed village divided by a war that nobody won.

Charlie finds out that this area of the world has a long and troubled history, that wars are complicated, and that long-time feuds can continue to divide neighbors generations later. But he also discovers that you don’t need to speak the same language to communicate with people. Not when you’re having a party in a field, surrounded by goats and dancing in the glow of car headlights with the radio blaring out Croatian music.

A warm, funny and thought-provoking book that celebrates a child’s love of adventure and boundless curiosity about the world.