Author Archives: Beth Wren

Poetry Corner | Poem #17

Who says that writing isn’t like giving birth? And a little bit like self-destruction too. I do my best work while the rest of the world is asleep, apparently, and it’s always going to be worth it.

How to Deal with the Post-Travel Blues

This post goes out to anyone who has ever been travelling for any good length of time, and you know exactly what I mean when I say Post-Travel Blues. It’s a real thing, guys. But there are ways you can counter the symptoms and learn to live a well-balanced, mindful and happy life back in […]

Poetry Corner | Poem #16: Blackbird

Spring has sprung and life, it blooms. I’ve just been thinking about the beauty in the everyday and the little moments which make up happiness, and I think I managed to capture this one on paper. I guess I don’t need kangaroos or koala bears after all, just the humble old blackbird.

Review: Room, Emma Donoghue

Jack is five. He lives with his Ma. They live in a single, locked room. They don’t have the key. Jack and Ma are prisoners. Room by Emma Donoghue is an extraordinarily powerful story of a mother and child kept in isolation, and the desire for, and price of, freedom. Room had been on my […]

Travels 2016: Wellington

Wellington was our last stop on New Zealand’s North Island, and asides from being a very small capital with only just more than 200,000 residents, we found it to be a very cool, relaxed and fun city. In our two days we did a walking tour of the city, took the cable car from Lambton […]

23 at 23

Or 23 things to tell myself at the grand old age of 23 and a half. There’s nothing wrong with being weird. And don’t let anyone else tell you otherwise. It’s really cool being a vegetarian, but not everybody else wants to hear about it. Idealism is all well and good, but sometimes a little realism […]

Travels 2016: North Island, New Zealand

Wait, stop! Before you read this blog post, have you caught up with my other travel posts, especially my Auckland one? Done it? Good. You may now proceed. Auckland → Paihia → Coromandel → Rotorua → Waitomo → Taupo → Wellington So our route around the North Island of New Zealand was planned to maximise how much we could see in […]

Poetry Corner | Poem #15 : Old Habits & New Moons

My Travel Essentials

So, I’m back from my travels, three-month holiday, spiritual experience, whatever you want to call it. And rather than wallow in nostalgia and sadness, I’ve put together a little list of my travel essentials. So here is my gift to you, and I hope that I am able to impart at least a little wisdom […]

Review: Wild, Cheryl Strayed

At twenty-six, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother’s rapid death from cancer, her family disbanded and her marriage crumbled. With nothing to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life: to walk eleven-hundred miles of the west coast of America and to do it alone. She […]