InterRail by Alessandro Gallenzi: book review

InterRail (2012) is set in Europe in 1992. The protagonist is young, naive 22-year-old Francesco, from the provincial town of Genzano in Italy.

Francesco wants an adventure and time away from his university studies, and buys a one-month InterRail ticket which enables him to travel by train throughout Europe, hopping on and off as the whim takes him. He travels light – everything is in one small bag that he throws over his shoulder. This is his first time travelling abroad.

He sets out from Rome, and the second day he meets the outrageous entrepreneur Pierre Cordier from Corsica. The decisions he makes takes Francesco off course, but he didn’t really have a ‘course.’ He meets regular and extravagent people; people he imposes upon and mostly people who impose upon him – such as an older married woman who asks him for a favour – and sets him on a path of mysterious intrigue, a bashing, and a robbery.

From Rome to Bologna, Munich, Cologne, Berlin, Wittenberg, Lund, Stockholm, Elsinore, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, London, Oxford, Paris, and Monte Carlo, he finds money, poverty, fun, adventure, deceit, and love. But what city does he decide to return to – to settle down – certainly not the provincial town, leaving his parents and sister behind.

InterRail is a light, easy travel read. Written in the third person, it is actually based on the author’s own experiences twenty years before the time of writing. Some of the characters and events go to the edge of credibility during the imbroglio scenes, although the situations with holiday love are better narrated.

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