A YEAR IN THE WORLD is classic Frances Mayes - a celebration of the allure of travel, of unexpected pleasures found in unlikely places and a joyous sense of adventure and discovery.

 Both a passionate traveller and the ideal travel companion, Mayes allows us to hitch a ride as she wanders off the beaten track and discovers twelve new special places in the world. Using her beloved Tuscany as a home base, she sets off to find hidden treasures in Spain and Portugal, France, the British Isles, and the Mediterranean world of Turkey, Greece, the south of Italy and North Africa. Along the way, she cooks up a storm in Portugal, follows the classic Homeric voyage across the Aegean, revels in the good life in Santorini and hunkers down in a stone house draped with bougainvillea in Crete. In Turkey she sails the ancient coast, snorkels over sunken Byzantine towns and hikes to ancient archeological sites. She takes a literary pilgrimage in Burgundy and gathers ideas in the gardens of Scotland and England. In Morocco, she explores the city of Fez, discovers the ideal place to live in Mantova - and much, much more. 

Weaving together the simple pleasures of everyday life with fascinating insights into the history, culture and culinary delights of her temporary homes in the world, this is travel writing at its best.

About the author: Frances Mayes
From wikipedia:
Frances Mayes (born 1940) is an American university professor, poet, memoirist, essayist, and novelist.

Born in Fitzgerald, Georgia, and raised in south central Georgia, Mayes attended Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Lynchburg, Virginia, and obtained her BA from the University of Florida. In 1975 she earned her MA from San Francisco State University, where she eventually became Professor of Creative Writing, director of The Poetry Center, and chair of the Department of Creative Writing.

Mayes has published several works of poetry: Climbing Aconcagua (1977), Sunday in Another Country (1977), After Such Pleasures (1979), The Arts of Fire (1982), Hours (1984), and Ex Voto (1995). In 1996 she published the book Under the Tuscan Sun: At Home in Italy. Written in the same vein as a A Year in Provence by British author Peter Mayle, Mayes's book was a memoir of her buying, renovating, and living in an abandoned villa in rural Cortona in Tuscany, a region of Italy. It went to Number One on the New York Times Best Seller list and remained on the list for over two years. In 2003 the film Under the Tuscan Sun was released. Adapted to the screen by director Audrey Wells, the movie was loosely based on Mayes's book. In 1999, Mayes followed this literary success with another international bestseller, Bella Tuscany: The Sweet Life in Italy, and in 2000 with In Tuscany. Mayes's first novel, Swan, was published in 2002.

Also a food-and-travel writer, Mayes is the editor of The Best American Travel Writing 2002 and the author of A Year in the World: Journeys of A Passionate Traveller (2006), tales of her and her husband's travels.

Now writing full time, she and her poet husband divide their time between homes in Hillsborough, North Carolina and Cortona, Italy.