A Time of Gifts

**A young Englishman recounts the first leg of his legendary 1934 walk from London to Constantinople in this memoir by “one of the greatest travel writers of all time” ( *Sunday Times* ).** At the age of 18, Patrick Leigh Fermor set off from the heart of London on an epic journey—to walk to Constantinople. *A Time of Gifts* is the rich account of his adventures as far as Hungary, after which *Between the Woods and the Water* continues the story to the Iron Gates that divide the Carpathian and Balkan mountains. Acclaimed for its sweep and intelligence, Leigh Fermor’s book explores a remarkable moment in time. Hitler has just come to power but war is still ahead, as he walks through a Europe soon to be forever changed—through the Lowlands to Mitteleuropa, to Teutonic and Slav heartlands, through the baroque remains of the Holy Roman Empire; up the Rhine, and down to the Danube. At once a memoir of coming-of-age, an account of a journey, and a dazzling exposition of the English language, *A Time of Gifts* is also a portrait of a continent already showing ominous signs of the holocaust to come.