Into the Moorish World

With an enticing cover with great graphic of Moorish architecture, this book tells of the authors experiences travelling in Andalusia and Morocco in the early 1970s. Published in 1972, it contains around 25 pages of black and white photographs - admittedly pretty poor for today's quality, but interesting nevertheless.

The author was around 40 years old on this journey, so no wide-eyed youth, and the writing reflects this. In parts fantastically interesting with vivid descriptions that transport the reader to the Medina's and madrasas. In other parts it becomes somewhat dense, perhaps overwritten, and a bit of a battle to get through. This may come from the fact the author verbosely explains every detail of his journey, each person he meets and each situation he is in. Some history and background is included, some literary references - previous visitors and what they had written, and some comparison with days gone by.

Perhaps if I had read it a little slower, giving it some more time I would have enjoyed it more, but it left me a little dissatisfied unfortunately. Maybe it was one of those situations where it wasn't the right book at the right time.

3.5 stars, rounded down to 3.