The best rambunctious adventure tales with grifters, rogues, scalawags, and scoundrels

We read The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden for my book club, but even more outlandish is The Hundred-Year Old Man Who Climbed out of the Window and Disappeared.

I wish I had written it! It is completely far-fetched and reads like a wacky Ian Fleming novel. If you are into quirky and wacky, you will love this novel. To avoid his hundredth birthday party, Allen Karlsson climbs out of the window of a nursing home and walks to the bus station. There, he takes care of a suitcase for a fellow passenger, which turns out to be full of drug money.

He is then chased by a gang, as well as the police. This adventure is right in keeping with the rest of his life. He was a weapons expert who worked in Spain during the civil war, China, and Russia. A colorful character, he met some heavy-hitters like Franco, Truman and even Stalin. This is fun and entertaining! 

On a recent visit to Ireland, A Thousand Moons was recommended by an Irish writer.

I did not know that there were Irish soldiers who fought in the Civil War. Since my family was originally from Ireland, (although they immigrated around the time of the Revolutionary War), this interested me. Thomas McNulty, one of the main characters in the novel, is an Irishman who fought in the Civil War and then later in the Indian War.

Winona, an orphan from the Lakota tribe, who used to Ojinjintka tells this tale. She was rescued by Thomas McNulty from being massacred. McNulty might be a tough guy, but he is also a cross-dresser! McNulty and his fellow soldier and partner, Cole adopt Winona as their own. When they are attacked by lawless militias, they must flee for their lives.

This novel really gives the reader a clear picture of the lawlessness of Reconstruction in the South. What I love about this novel is Winona’s voice, which is that of a colloquial storyteller who can spin a yarn.

This summer I visited Fort Davis, Texas and learned about the “buffalo” soldiers who were stationed there in the 1860s.

This was the nickname for African-American soldiers, who were separate regiments in the U.S. Army. McBride’s novel deals with a “buffalo” regiment but is set in World War II in Italy. I did not know anything about the experiences of African-American soldiers in World War II.

What I really loved about this book was the unlikely situations that a small group of African-American soldiers find themselves in a tiny village in Italy, under siege from the Germans. Despite the differences in culture and language, the soldiers find refuge and friendship with an Italian peasant, who is raising rabbits under the floorboards of his ramshackle cabin.

One of their pals saves a disturbed Italian orphan and the small group of soldiers, separated from their regiment, get sidetracked by this humanitarian mission in the midst of a larger military campaign. Even though there is a great deal of sadness in the book, many of the characters are quirky and hilarious. 

I reviewed this novel, and I really loved it. Many folks think they know what migrants experience from the news, but this novel tells the story with a different spin: an Egyptian Bedouin who tries to get to Italy via Libya.

Living in Libya is as absurd as it is dangerous. The narrator is a hassler, but you still feel sorry for him when he almost gets killed by a customer for using cheap spray paint in a body shop in Libya. Besides the body shop, he works as a bootlegger, cook, and a concrete-block maker before he makes a harrowing crossing on a flimsy boat across the Mediterranean.

Once in Italy, he gets a few jobs in construction but then falls into a gang of drug dealers. He is Egyptian but pretends to be an Iraqi named “Baffo.” One crazy thing happens after another until he needs to make a great escape from Italy. 

Abu Golayyel's humor is typically Egyptian. Oral storytellers, even on the streets of Cairo, exaggerate wildly. I feel this type of exaggeration has sneaked into my own work. The novel tells the adventures of a Bedouin who migrates to Italy via Libya!

Everyone knows about Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer, but don’t forget Innocents Abroad. I recently read this because I also write travel pieces.

Mark Twain is one of my idols and I am inspired by his humor and the way he utilizes “the tall tale” even in his travel writing. Innocents Abroad is a travelogue about his experiences on what he called the “Great Pleasure Excursion,” or the European Tour in 1867. No one escapes his eagle eye—snobbish Americans and con operators in the Holy Land, alike.