Book Info
My Love Affair with England: A Traveler’s Memoir by Susan Allen Toth (1992)
Genre: Nonfiction, Memoir, Travel
LibraryThing: https://www.librarything.com/work/56906/
Acquired from: Capitol Hill Books, Denver, Colorado, USA ($7.50) [see also: Indie Bookstore Visit Log]
Started reading: October 31, 2025
Finished reading: November 4, 2025
Review
I picked this up because I nearly bought it from a UBS in Milwaukee a few months ago. It caught my eye again, mostly because I’m planning to go to England for a few months next year AND I adore pre-internet travel memoirs, so I decided to get it!
It’s a very charming book which focuses mostly on the bits of England that the author enjoyed, mixed in with some memoir-type stuff about her personal life and how it intersected with her visits to England and how that affected her time there. I enjoyed reading about the specific things she likes, as you can tell she REALLY likes them– but not to the point where it sounds like ass-kissing.
I also liked that she said specifically she only likes visiting and doesn’t want to move there; often I find that actually living somewhere is way different than being a visitor, often to the location’s detriment because now you have to deal with things like sorting trash and paying electricity bills, when really what you want to do is wander around looking at old buildings and eating bacon sandwiches.
Having been to England myself several times I recognized a lot of the stuff she was talking about, and that was fun, too. Overall I really enjoyed this book!
Reading Notes
Page 9:
I do not blame the English. If they keep to themselves, I also keep to myself. At home in America, I guard my privacy, cherishing the easy and congenial company of my husband or quiet time alone. When I am in England, I need even more meditative space. Since I travel quite intensely, looking and listening and walking hard, at night I am ready to stop. I have to absorb what I experience and gather my energies for the next day. I want to sink into bed with a book, not traipse down to the pub to talk about politics or football. So I do not usually make social overtures.
Same!!
Page 45: Just checked and the Geographer’s A-Z map company that she used in the 1960s still exists, sort of— was bought out by a bigger publishing company in 2019. That said, their website doesn’t list a London map specifically, just regions of GB.
Page 209: A “live-in babysitter” is surely just a nanny? One she apparently is paying in housing/food and not money. Yikes. And then the “babysitter” doesn’t seem to be doing anything anyway, lmao.
Page 220: The way she writes about plays makes me want to see some! I’m usually a musical-only sort of person but if I can get a £15 ticket to some Shakespeare play why not. Of course, I don’t think I CAN get a £15 ticket nowadays…
Page 223: (re:her love affair with some British guy) omg it’s that scenario from Friends where the guy pretends he hasn’t been able to have sex for a long time and is getting divorced etc and the new woman can “fix” him and then he disappears because of course he isn’t getting divorced and it was all a con
Page 276: This is one of the places they stayed at. Wow!
Page 282:
We subscribe to the thumbprint school of travel, which commits us to spending at least a week in one spot no larger than my thumbprint will cover on a standard folding road map of England. Within this small space of a ten- or fifteen-mile radius, we take daily excursions, limiting them to a half-hour drive each way, which always seems quite long enough on narrow, winding, and high-hedged roads. In almost every few square miles of England, or at least the parts of it we choose to visit, we find more to see and explore than we can ever manage in our allotted time.
I love this! I do something similar, but I stick to 1 hour by bus/train as my max distance most times. And honestly even then I’d prefer closer to half an hour.
Also really loved the chapter about footpaths. That’s ALSO one of my favorite things about England!
And another thing: she talks about specific guidebooks for things like gardens and old houses and whatever– honestly, I’m starting to swing back to getting paper copies of things like that, too, especially if I can get them in the country/from locals. It’s so much easier to just flip through some pages than try to search a massive website or blog, and if it’s outdated in some way I can usually find updated info by asking a local anyway. I don’t know that I’d necessarily want something like a Lonely Planet chunkster, but a book about super-local hikes and stuff is always great to have.
See also: Books Read (2025) / All Reading Logs
tozka | 📖 reading log: my love affair with england by susan allen toth