It has been a busy month pre-publication for The Slow Road to Tehran. Last Saturday she gained a fantastic review by James Barr in The Times:
And on Monday she was interviewed by Mariella Frostrop on Times Radio.
Earlier in the month, Rebecca was featured in the Guardian for International Women’s Day.
We have also received two fanatic endorsements:
‘The idea of cycling from England to Iran seems to me completely barmy – heroically barmy, magnificently barmy, in the style of the great travellers of the past who walked on foot to the South Pole or rode on camels to China. Not even straight to Iran, but by way of Egypt and Sudan, the Sahara and the Persian Gulf – 11,000 kilometres – a whole year balanced on two wheels, held upright and propelled only by her own muscle-power. Over impossible mountain ranges, on uncyclable roads, through states where being a foreigner or a woman is discouraged. She writes about it with wonderful vividness and self-mockery. And she is a real traveller. She stays, eats, and drinks, one way or another, with local people, and for brief, intense moments shares a little of their lives. She knows an extraordinary amount about the history and current politics of everywhere she goes, always complex and usually painful, with problems often shamingly rooted in the colonialist inheritance. Everywhere she discovers a reciprocal friendliness and curiosity, and a changing world that often belies the expectations that outsiders have of it.’
Michael Frayn
‘Here’s a book in the great tradition of the British lone traveller – those spirited individuals who set off to explore Foreign Lands with an open heart, determined against all odds to see what joys they might find. Rebecca Lowe is a cross between her two illustrious forebears, Eric Newby and Dervla Murphy. Her carefully woven tale is insightful, delightful – full of gusto and grit, and always entertaining.’
Benedict Allen
Look out for a review in the Financial Times, and if you want to catch Rebecca in action she’s appearing at Stanfords, Covent Garden on 31 March.
