Love books & travel? Welcome aboard!
The world is a large and amazing place filled with fascinating people — and one lifetime is too short to visit and get to know them all. That’s why our favorite books have a strong sense of place. They help us travel — at least in our imaginations — to destinations all over the globe, to meet people we might never get to know in real life.
Not only is the trip a whole lot of fun, we believe in our bones that reading good books increases empathy. Empathy is good for you and good for the world around us. We want more of that.
So we created Strong Sense of Place — a podcast, website, and this Substack dedicated to travel and the books we love.
Subscribe to get full access to the newsletter and publication archives.
We’re David and Melissa…
… the creative team behind Strong Sense of Place.
We’ve been a couple since 1992, and one of our favorite things to do together is explore new places — and then to sit quietly and read. We're two introverts who crave adventures, as long as we get to choose the time and place. We’ve visited 27 countries and 34 U.S. states... so far. It’s our mission to share the things we see, learn, and read with you.
In 2017, we sold almost all of our stuff and moved from the U.S. to Prague, in the Czech Republic, with our laptops and our cat Smudge. It’s a fantastic, magical, liveable city — and it’s an excellent home base for other travel.
The Stuff We Make
Strong Sense of Place podcast: In each episode of our show, we get curious about one destination and talk about what makes it different from everywhere else on Earth — then we recommend five great books that took us there on the page (with zero spoilers because book spoilers are rude.) Releases every other Friday.
The Library of Lost Time show: A short-and-sweet podcast! In just 10 minutes, we discuss two new book releases at the top of our TBR and share a fun book- or travel-related distraction. Releases every other Friday.
Why Subscribe, and What Do You Get?
Our free newsletter requires nothing from you except your curiosity when it shows up in your inbox. Just grab a nice cuppa and settle in for a fun read.
Tuesday Tea: An invitation to chat about bookish topics with us and other (charming, intelligent, friendly) readers.
Friday Endnotes: A communique from Mel with behind-the-scenes and bonus goodies related to our new podcast episodes, plus her favorite book- and travel-related links of the week. There are always beautiful photos and book recommendations — there are often recipes and silliness. Basically, it’s a bunch of fun stuff to kick off the weekend.
Thank you!
Book people are the best people, and we're so happy you've joined us.
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