A Journey with Elsa Cloud

When she was young, Leila Hadley's grandmother told her that James Boswell, her great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, "may have been naughty, indiscreet, and intemperate, but he was an excellent journalist." Born to be a traveler and writer, Hadley has spent her life exploring India and Africa, the Middle East and Asia, and writing about it with luminous intelligence, unsparing insight, and earthy wit. This is an account of Hadley's tour across India with her estranged daughter. She evokes the smells, fruits, and colors of India, all the while trying to work out a new relationship with Veronica. Hers is one of the few voices that can do justice to India, with its inundation of the senses, history, art, bazaars, and humanity. Add to that the gentle inclusion of stories--her childhood, failed marriages, mothering traumas--and you've got a stirring travelogue and a powerfully beautiful memoir.