Belonging to the World is an inspirational travel memoir that shares your journey of healing after the tragic loss of your wife and your mission to travel to all 193 countries on earth, and the personal transformation you experience. Why was this an important book for you to write?
I did not start out traveling to write a book, but rather as a means of escape. It was one year into my journey, after a compelling trip to Afghanistan only a year after the Taliban takeover, that I realized that I was really “living” again, learning and, most of all, collecting stories. At that point, I realized that there was an evolving story that I needed to tell. It was about the healing powers of travel and connection.
What were some ideas that were important for you to share in this book?
Sure, other than specific profound connections with people from everyday life in countries all over the world, below are some themes and ideas that kept coming to the surface:
Ø The unexpected and transformative power of grief
Ø Letting go of control brings unexpected peak experiences around the world
Ø Finding awe and wonder in the world’s places considered some of the world’s most dangerous
Ø The best things in life can happen by chance if you let them
Ø Reconciling a world that feels deeply divided yet profoundly interconnected
Ø How do we honor the past yet be ready to step into what may come next
Ø How the world can change you if you let it
What was the most challenging part of writing your memoir, and what was the most rewarding?
It took me a while in my journey to understand that I wasn’t simply seeking new countries, but the people within them. With that came the anticipation of finding the one story in each place that resonated with me, my story, shaped by my own impressions and by the mystery of how and when it would reveal itself. Somehow, it always did.
I found that profoundly moving: the realization that if you seek people and their wisdom with an open heart and genuine respect, you will find it.
How has writing your memoir impacted or changed your life?
I am sure for many writers, the release of a book is the end of a big project. For me it is end of a significant entire chapter of my life, of devastating loss, of being lost, of leaning into grief and going on a amazing journey. That journey completely rewired my brain and changed the way I see the world and my place in it.
Readers’ Choice Book Awards Bronze Winner, Adult Nonfiction
Some journeys we choose. Others choose us.
In the aftermath of tragedy, Barry Hoffner wanted to feel the pulse of the world again. The whole world. When Barry Hoffner lost his wife and travel partner, Jackie, in a sudden tragedy, his grief was a black hole that consumed everything. But amid the quiet wreckage of loss, something unexpected stirred: the call to move, to reconnect, and to live fully again. What began as a reluctant return to the road became an audacious mission to visit all 193 countries on Earth-not to escape his pain but to transform it. Along the way, Barry discovered a world with far more depth and complexity than headlines suggest-one full of unexpected joy, even amid hardship and struggle. From war zones to mountaintops, refugee camps to ancient ruins, he found people whose kindness and openness brought him back to life. Belonging to the World is a deeply felt memoir of healing from grief, finding resilience, and forging human connection across the globe
Belonging to the World follows Barry Hoffner’s journey from the sudden loss of his wife, Jackie, to an unexpected path of healing as he travels to every country on earth. The book opens with the shattering grief of Jackie’s death and the dark, disorienting months that follow, then widens into a story about connection, curiosity, and the raw power of human kindness. Hoffner moves through deserts in Oman, chaos and beauty in Afghanistan, warmth in Syria, wonder in Bhutan, and countless small moments of humanity that tell him he still belongs to the world, even when he feels unmoored from it. It is both a memoir of loss and a chronicle of awe, written with honesty and a clear desire to understand people wherever he goes.
As I read, I felt pulled into his emotional rhythm. Sometimes he writes with a quiet weight, almost like he is whispering because the grief is still too close. Other times, he throws himself into a scene with bright energy, like he is hungry to feel alive again. I found that mix moving. It mirrors how grief actually behaves. It hits hard, then softens, then surprises you all over again. The travel stories aren’t just pretty postcard moments. They are the places where he bumps into his own pain and also where he finds these tiny sparks of connection. I loved how often strangers show up at the perfect time. It made me think about how people everywhere have this instinct to reach toward someone who hurts.
I also appreciated the simplicity of the writing. He doesn’t try to sound wise or polished, and I liked that. It feels like someone telling you the truth as they live it. The chapters unfold quickly, each country arriving like a new test or a new chance. I sometimes wished he lingered longer, especially in the places that clearly changed him. But the pace also reflects his state of mind. After loss, standing still can feel dangerous. Moving forward feels like survival. And the way he carries Jackie with him in every experience made me ache. It never felt sentimental. It felt real.
By the end, I had this sense that the world he traveled through became less a map and more a mirror. Every landscape, every border crossing, every shared meal made him a little braver and a little softer. I didn’t finish the book thinking about travel as a checklist. I finished it thinking about how connection works. How people can stitch you back together without even knowing they’re doing it. How a life can shift from broken to open if you let yourself keep going, one unfamiliar place at a time.
I would recommend Belonging to the World to anyone traveling through grief, anyone who loves travel stories with heart, and anyone who wants to see the world as more generous than the headlines make it seem. It’s especially good for readers who don’t need tidy lessons and who are comfortable walking beside someone still figuring it all out. The book feels like a companion for anyone trying to rebuild after life comes apart.
Lunches with Ed tells the story of a woman caring for her husband as dementia slowly changes every corner of their shared life. The book follows Judy Collier’s journey from the first troubling signs to the caregiving years at home, the painful decision to move Ed to long-term care, the strange mix of heartbreak and sweetness in her daily visits, and finally the peaceful end of his life. She lays out the memories through stories, journal entries, and reflections that show love staying steady even as everything else slips away.
The writing feels simple at first, almost like someone talking to a friend over coffee, yet that is exactly what makes it so strong. The plainness pulls you in. You start to feel the fear she tries to hide and the way she keeps moving anyway. There were moments that made me laugh because they felt so human and odd, like Ed grouping his grapes into sets of four or insisting his license was locked in the doctor’s desk. Then I’d turn a page and feel my chest tighten when he wandered outside in the middle of the night or when she held window visits during the long months of Covid. The emotional swings felt real. They felt like life. I found myself pausing often just to sit with it.
What stayed with me most was how she writes about devotion. Not as some grand thing but as a series of small acts that never stop. Holding his hand while he sleeps. Feeding him when he forgets how. Talking to shadows in the corner because it eased his fear. None of it feels dramatic. It feels steady and warm and a little exhausting and also brave in a quiet way. The journal entries hit me especially hard. They show the rhythm of her days shifting between hope and dread. They show how love keeps showing up even when the person you love is drifting somewhere you cannot follow. I felt myself rooting for both of them and sometimes whispering a little prayer under my breath because the truth of it all was so heavy.
I closed the book with a mix of sadness and gratitude. Sadness because the story is real, and loss is real. Gratitude because the author chose to share something so personal and because her honesty might make someone else feel less alone. I would recommend Lunches with Ed to caregivers, family members walking through dementia, readers drawn to memoir, and anyone who wants a reminder that tenderness still matters in hard seasons.
Nether Land follows the tangled rise and tragic end of Ed Netherland, a boy from Murfreesboro who grows into a bold, brilliant, often reckless man whose life eventually spirals into money schemes, fraud, and a mysterious death on St. John Island. The story begins with his funeral and jumps back to the author’s childhood, tracing decades of shifting friendships, grudges, ambition, and uneasy admiration. The book pairs coming-of-age moments with a slow, unsettling unraveling of Ed’s world, and by the time the narrative returns to that final day in 2014, the path feels both inevitable and deeply strange.
While reading it, I felt pulled into a long conversation with the author, one that wandered through memory in a way that felt warm, irritated, tender, and suspicious all at once. His writing is simple on the surface, yet tight with tension underneath. I liked how he captured the awkward cliques and rivalries of Central High. I also felt his lingering resentment toward Ed slip through, even when he tried to be neutral. That honesty made the book feel more vivid. The chapters about UT football, fraternity life, and early adulthood had a friendly, nostalgic tone. Then the tone shifted. The deeper the book went into Ed’s business dealings, the more the storytelling tightened. I could feel the author wrestling with disbelief. The emotional through-line held steady even when the pacing slowed because he kept circling the same question that I found myself asking, too. How does a smart kid from a decent home end up in a storm of lies, lawsuits, and danger.
I kept thinking about the author’s mix of curiosity and frustration. He wrote with affection for the people who shaped him, although not always affection for Ed. Even so, he treated Ed as a real person and not a tabloid headline. I liked that balance. Sometimes I felt the narrative turning slightly dreamy as he drifted back into old school hallways or late-night parking lots. Other times, the writing snapped into something harder when he described the financial tricks, the false promises, and that chilling stretch before the murder. I found myself reacting in quick swings. I laughed at small teenage moments. I felt annoyed at Ed’s constant posturing. I felt sad when the story reached the island and stayed there. The emotional unpredictability made the book gripping, and I never drifted away from the author’s voice.
I would recommend Nether Land to readers who enjoy true crime that leans more toward reflection than sensationalism and to people who like memoirs about Southern towns, complicated friendships, and the strange ways ambition can bend a life. If you enjoy true crime with heart, you’ll enjoy Nether Land.
Book of Me felt like sitting across from Kevin in a diner while he talked me through his life, one wild episode at a time. This nonfiction autobiography-memoir traces his journey from a rough-and-tumble childhood over a butcher shop in Queens to the cookie-cutter dream of Levittown, through hippie days and garage bands, brushes with rock legends, marriages and divorce, a Christian conversion, big wins in real estate, brutal losses, bipolar disorder, cancer, and a late-life run at politics and entrepreneurship. The book is broken into short, titled episodes that move mostly in order, each one another story about how this ordinary guy kept stumbling into extraordinary situations, learning to laugh, get back up, and lean hard on his faith.
The writing keeps the feel of spoken storytelling, which makes sense since Kevin originally told these stories on camera. You can hear him in the run-on excitement of a good memory and the quick punch of a painful one. The style is loose and conversational, sometimes a little meandering, but it feels honest rather than messy, like listening to a friend who has a lot of life to cover and is trying not to leave out the good parts. As a memoir, it reads less like a polished literary project and more like a long, vivid conversation, helped along by the pencil sketches and the playful chapter titles that keep you turning pages to see what ridiculous thing happens next. At times, I wanted a bit more trimming or reflection between the anecdotes, but the energy and humor kept pulling me back in.
I also appreciated the choices he makes about what to show and how vulnerable he is willing to be. Kevin leans hard on self-deprecating humor, especially when he is talking about getting into trouble as a kid, crashing on the ice, or starting one more half-baked business, and that humor softens you up before he walks you into heavier territory. When he writes about his Christian conversion, his mental breakdown and bipolar diagnosis, or facing cancer, the tone shifts in a way that feels earned. He does not pretend to have it all together. Instead, he keeps circling back to this idea that life is about the journey, about falling, learning, and getting back up with God, family, and a few loyal friends at your side. In a genre that can sometimes feel like a highlight reel, it was refreshing to see him include so many moments where he did not look good, or did not win, or just barely survived.
By the end, I felt like I had been on a long road trip with someone who talks a lot, laughs loudly, prays openly, and is deeply aware that he has been both reckless and blessed. This is an autobiography for readers who enjoy true, larger-than-life stories more than careful literary craft, who like faith-driven narratives, and who do not mind a little chaos mixed in with their inspiration.
The Athlete Whisperer is a vivid and unfiltered memoir that shares how you became the first woman in sports broadcasting, the discrimination and harassment, the hard-won successes, and the future you helped shape for women. Why was this an important book for you to write?
To uncover how I feel now about what I experienced and denied at the time.
What was the most challenging part of writing your memoir, and what was the most rewarding?The heartbreaking, personal stories were challenging to retell.
The most rewarding has been the connection with readers who see themselves in my story, and feel reconciled.
What advice do you have for other women who are fighting against gender discrimination in their own fields?
Read this book. The examples I faced will prepare you well. Find mentors and friends to support you.
What do you hope is one thing readers take away from your story?
Most people are good. Find mentors. Respect yourself. Keep boundaries. Do what you love, and do it so well people can’t take their eyes off you! Pay it forward.
Andrea Kirby was not a former athlete and had no ties to television. Still, in 1971, this single mom talked her way onto a small television station as a sportscaster. A rare female in the all-male culture of her beloved sports, she was harassed and discriminated against, but she wasn’t deterred.
Kirby excelled at her first break and then moved to a bigger market in sports-rich Baltimore. Male colleagues said she didn’t belong, but fans loved her, teams respected her, and networks noticed her. In 1977, ABC Sports hired Andrea Kirby as its first full-time female announcer. Hosting the College Football Scoreboard and traveling the world for Wide World of Sports was her hard-fought dream come true.
Heartbreakingly, the dream ended. Kirby’s survival became another great adventure. Then, a chance interview with a famous basketball player changed everything, inspiring an idea so original that it appeared as a question in the board game Trivial Pursuit.
A rare, entertaining, and uplifting story, The Athlete Whisperer will inspire any reader with an improbable dream.
East to West Across Russia follows a man who chases a childhood dream to ride the Trans-Siberian Railway from Vladivostok all the way to Moscow, on a journey of self-discovery and introspection. What was the inspiration for the set-up of your story?
In the dedication at the beginning of the book I wrote
‘Dear N, I dedicate the words written on these pages drenched in the cloak of my melancholy to you my great love. Has there ever been a light so illuminating, a smile so effervescent? We walked together hand in hand but now it is only I with my dreams of a love I once knew and the fate of that love never to burn in my heart again. Always, D
The entire narrative lives and dies and is fuelled by the character N. She is nameless and for many she is not even seen as a real life person. Some see her as a ghostly figure, a faint representation of an idealised love while others have seen her as a symbol of Old Rus, that grand and mythical era where all Soviet and Russian people long to return to. Perhaps she exists or perhaps she does not exist. In the end it really doesn’t matter but for the protagonist D, N is everything he ever wished for and dreamt of. He has no memory of life before she existed and the memory of her since she faded away from his heart continues to burn and ruptures the core of his being. D moves from east to west slowly across Russia but he also moves slowly from his past into his present and contemplating on a future without N who lingers long in his thoughts.
What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?
The theme of memory is crucial to the narrative of the story. It is a memoir of the protagonist as he traverses the longest train journey in the world but more importantly it is a memoir of the past and the many layers that exist not only within D but within the human mind. Every place the human being experiences becomes part of his collective memories. We can never go to any place and simply not exist and have an experience of that place. Wherever we go, there we are and a memory and timeline of such a place will always reside within us whether we can recall such a memory or not. I wanted to explore and show the theme of solitude through the nomadic wanderings of the protagonist D. We live in a world that is teeming with life but as a unique individual being in this world we can never understand what it feels like to be another human being. We can only ever feel and understand what it is to be oneself. I cannot be another human being and another human being cannot be me. We can only reside within oneself so in my narrative across the vast terrain that is both Siberia and Russia I tried to depict such solitude, such bleakness, such passion, such love, such philosophical thoughts within the individual traveller. D is an individual but when the reader gets to see and contemplate his inner thoughts we begin to understand that we too are like D. We have fears, we have anger, we have deep emotions, we have dreams and desires. We see our human frailties through D and especially so when he moves through the immeasurable raw beauty that is Siberia. The human becomes frail and finite when resting alongside such natural places of wonder. The theme of nationalism takes central stage in the long monologue scene set at Lake Baikal. The protagonist D calls out from his own brokenness across the sublime waters of Baikal and wonders is there anybody out there to listen to such a cry. In his monologue, D specifically points to the 20th century and the many examples of nationalism that aimed to divide and to destroy human beings. For D, nationalism is everything that is insular and divisive about our world. When we are nationalistic we only look inward and see a blind image of the world where we choose to fight for our own nations and in the process we challenge, deride and abuse other nations especially the much smaller ones. Nationalism becomes the great evil and occupier of human beings. We cannot become vessels for peace when the stain and blood of nationalism continues to be fuelled from within our own nations. At the core of all wars whether they be civil or world wars is a disturbed view of nationalism whose only aim it is to conquer, destroy and rule. What narrative anywhere can exist without the age old themes of life and death? They are the themes of our humanity. Life and death are inextricably linked for the protagonist D in his wanderings and tale across Russia. As D physically moves across the endless terrain of Russia the interior world becomes fused with the external and natural world of the environment. The melancholy of such thoughts within D become more pronounced as his mind wanders and lingers within his own brokenness. The 20th century of death and mayhem are used and depicted by D in his long monologue scene. Everything about that century brought human cruelty and barbarity into a new era of lust and a desire for death over life. For D, death became the great aggressor and nemesis against life and the human condition. Human illness becomes for D the natural consequence for the stain that was written into our soul from our birth. However, the philosophical and continuous choice that humans have allows us to choose whether we want our lives to be fuelled with a desire to destroy or by an energy to live and accept such a stain of corruption that is part of all of us but which we can decide not to act upon such dark impulses.
All of us human beings understands what it means and what it feels to be loved. We were all loved by somebody at one time but familial love is very different to romantic love. When we love another person in a romantic way we slowly move away from the ego that drives our energy and we channel all of our energies and desires into this other person. It becomes heroic and unselfish as we begin to love another person more than we love oneself. When that love cracks, breaks and fades into nothingness a great chasm exists for the one who has been rejected. The grief is paramount, real and it often manifests into a deep-seated melancholy just like how a physical illness attacks the human body. This is the reality for D, the hero of this tale across Russia. Who or what is D without N in his life? He was once loved by her but now she has gone and he does not have a roadmap to navigate a route back to life and love. He wanders from one place to the next and tries to live but N continues to occupy his heart. He does not know how to live and to love without her. The vast and unending plains of Russia are symbolic for the vast and unending love that D has and holds for N. I was trying to depict and expose more of the internal struggles of man. We never truly understand the magnificence and mystery of such an internal world. The reader whilst travelling on this journey across Russia will stand and sit next to D and begin to feel all of his emotions as they are released from his mind and heart. When they read and experience D’s tale they will also go along their own journey as their own memories become heightened and alive with nostalgia and feeling.
I find sometimes authors ask themselves questions and let their characters answer them. Do you think this is true for your characters?
As an author I often ask questions of myself and wonder how it feels to think in a certain way, how it feels like to undergo an illness, a grief, a torment, how it feels like to be truly loved and to love another unconditionally, how it feels like to be truly happy. In this tale across Russia it is primarily D who slowly answers such questions. Before D set out on his journey across Russia he was curious what it would feel like to stand next to the largest freshwater lake in the world at Lake Baikal. He had no idea what feelings and emotions would stir up in him on witnessing the mighty Taiga Forest range and the immense happiness that he would experience on simply riding the trains without any agenda or goal in mind other than to live and experience the pleasure of living in such a finite moment. There is a scene in the book where D meets a family on the train to Moscow. D is all alone and has lost his family and so the depiction of Christina and her family reveals to D the meaning and purity that exists within a family setting. Christina and her family become the manifestation of the ideal for D, something to admire, something to long for and a reminder of the once severing of his family. Christina reminds D that he can love again but D longs only for his N, the cradle of his spirit. There are two characters in the book who remind D of his father. He meets a policeman in Ulan-Ude and a security guard named Yuri in Yekaterinburg. It is Yuri’s wish to one day go to Irkutsk and to see Lake Baikal with his own eyes as it reminds him of his father. In these two characters D is reminded about when we are more similar in this world than how we are divisive. On his final train journey to Moscow D contemplates on the journey that has passed and has a connection with his future self who echoes his thoughts and his soul to truly live and enjoy such finite moments as such moments will one day cease for all of us. The future D becomes the present and the past D as the readers get to listen to such words travelling from the future into the present in the silence of the moving train as sleep awaits. The thoughts of D are from the future but echoing along his heart in the present as he tries to move on from the continuous pain that he carried within him since N departed his life.
What is the next book that you’re working on and when can your fans expect it out?
My second book will be very different to my first book as this first book focussed on the author in a very personal way and was a memoir from a specific point in time. This second book is going to be a collection of twenty Short Stories set in various European locations. They are fictional tales and a snapshot of life as it was lived by its characters. I have ten of these stories written already with another ten stories to write. I have chosen locations such as Paris, Copenhagen, Venice, Lake Bled, Chernobyl, Bergen, Stockholm, Berlin, Barcelona, Weimar and diverse topics such as memory loss, first love, childhood trauma, illness, loss of love, dreams, the natural and artificial environment, the epistolary form of memory and longing, the sanctity of life. I hope to have this second book completed by the end of 2026.
Embark on a captivating journey across the vast Russian steppe aboard the iconic Trans-Siberian Railway in this modern tale of self-discovery and introspection. The narrator, known only as D, begins his westward voyage in Vladivostok, traversing the ever-changing landscapes that unfold before him. As time moves inexorably onward, the everyday lives of the passengers intertwine with the rhythmic churning of the train’s propellers, contrasting sharply with the raw silence of the natural world beyond the windows. As the journey progresses, D’s physical expedition takes an unexpected turn, delving into the depths of his own psyche. A haunting presence, N, permeates the narrative, her essence imbued in the natural world, particularly at the breathtaking Lake Baikal in Siberia. N represents the one who got away, leaving a void and a profound fragility within D’s soul, scattering her ghostly influence across the many places his footsteps tread. Immersed in the tranquil vistas of the external world, D finds himself enamoured by the everyday characters he encounters along the way. As he navigates the complexities of his inner turmoil and the beauty of his surroundings, the narrator embarks on a transformative odyssey. The D who began his journey in Vladivostok will inevitably be different from the one who arrives in Moscow at journey’s end, but what will this transformation entail? Join D on this introspective voyage as he unravels the mysteries of his past, present, and future on the Trans-Siberian Railway.
East to West Across Russia follows a man who chases a childhood dream across the entire span of Russia. He flies to Vladivostok and then rides the Trans Siberian Railway all the way to Moscow. Along the way, he wanders through fog-soaked hills, quiet cities, lonely platforms, and the deep interior of his own memory. The story blends real travel with imagined scenes that reveal his heartbreak, his longing, and his hunger for meaning. Russia’s forests, rivers, and rail stations move past his window like an old film reel, and he uses every mile to reach inward as much as he reaches westward.
The writing swings between poetic and raw, sometimes in the space of a single page. I liked that about it. The style is big on feeling and big on atmosphere. I caught myself smiling at the simple little moments, like the chaos of breakfast or the clinking of tea glasses on the train. Other times I felt a tug in my chest when he drifted into memories of lost love or those spiraling thoughts that come when the world is quiet and a person finally has to face himself. The prose has a kind of earnest honesty that feels almost old-fashioned, and it hit me harder than I expected.
There were moments, though, when the intensity of the reflection felt a bit heavy. Every small detail seems to carry emotional weight, and every encounter becomes a doorway into deeper meaning. Part of me admired that dedication. Still, the narrator’s sincerity kept me grounded. I found myself rooting for him even when he veered into melancholy. His curiosity about Russia, about its people and history and vastness, felt real. His tenderness toward strangers, even brief ones like Alexei on the plane, made the journey feel warm and human.
By the time I reached the final pages, I felt the quiet satisfaction that comes after finishing a long trip and finally setting your bags down. I walked away thinking this book fits readers who love travel stories that linger in the soul rather than just list places on a map. It will speak to anyone who enjoys reflective writing, who has ever chased a dream across a border, or who has ever tried to heal by moving forward one small step at a time. If you want a journey that is both physical and emotional and are willing to sit with someone else’s heart for a while, this book is a good companion.
LITERARY TITAN 