Dinner with Persephone by Patricia Storace

I do believe that the best way to understand a subject is to explore it from all different perspectives and angles.  And that is exactly why I'm glad to have read this book.

Storace is an America poet, one with a love of Greece, who wrote this work of non-fiction (subtitled Travels In Greece) about a year she spent there in the 1990s.

She presents what I believe to be a very real picture of Greece, in all its beauty, coupled with all of its contradictions, struggles and darkness.

Storace spends the year living in Athens, but making frequent trips throughout the country, to some of the expected places, but more often to those far off the beaten path.

I caught glimpses of places we will visit in or trip this fall (throughout Athens, but also including Kardamyli, Mani and Hydra).

But mostly her writing bring to life Greece's struggle to fully enter the modern world, exploring whether or not it even wants to.  Greece is both blessed and saddled with its ancient past.

I'm grateful for her unvarnished stories, which only increase my interest in further exploring this fascinating country.