Journeys Home: Inspiring Stories, Plus Tips and Strategies to Find Your Family History

By Andrew McCarthy and National Geographic Travl Team

Addressing the explosive growth in ancestral travel, this compelling narrative combines intriguing tales of discovery with tips on how to begin your own explorations. Actor and award-winning travel writer Andrew McCarthy’s featured story recounts his recent quest to uncover his family’s Irish history, while twenty-five other prominent writers tell their own heartfelt stories of connection. Spanning the globe, these stories offer personal takes on journeying home, whether the authors are actively seeking long-lost relatives, meeting up with seldom-seen family members, or perhaps just visiting the old country to get a feel for their roots. Sidebars and a hefty resource section provide tips and recommendations on how to go about your own research, and a foreword by the Genographic Project’s Spencer Wells sets the scene. Stunning images, along with family heirlooms, old photos, recipes, and more, round out this unique take on the genealogical research craze.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Feb 3, 2015
• ISBN: 9781426215025

Andrew McCarthy

Since starring in movies like Pretty in Pink, St Elmo’s Fire and Less Than Zero, ANDREW McCARTHY has become a director, an award-winning travel writer and a bestselling author. He has directed more than eighty hours of television, including Orange Is the New Black, The Blacklist, Gossip Girl and many others. For a dozen years he served as editor at large at National Geographic Traveler and his award-winning travel writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Atlantic and TIME. He is the author of a travel memoir, The Longest Way Home, and a young-adult novel, Just Fly Away, both New York Times bestsellers.

Reviews for Journeys Home

[thornton37814 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

National Geographic brings us this book, published in 2015, on heritage tourism. Using journalists' stories about their family history, each takes a trip to an ancestral home. Some authors followed better genealogical practices than others did. Some simply relied on family stories which may or may not be correct. A few made their journey based on National Geographic's now-defunct DNA test. I was disappointed the well-documented stories of well-regarded genealogists who also know how to write were not included. Most stories contain a "Connections" sidebar which often includes restaurants or recipes and a "Get to Know" sidebar providing information about the country. A brief "Genealogy 101" section and country-specific research tips are included after the stories. The country-specific information is often too brief to be all that helpful, but it often points to the FamilySearch wiki which remains useful and updated as more and more microfilm and records are digitized around the world. Some information, of course, is dated. For example, National Geographic no longer offers their DNA test. There are a couple of new players in the field and a glaring omission of 23andMe as a DNA testing company. The best books on genetic genealogy have been written since the book's publication, making that section dated. Some major digital repositories for some countries seem to be missing, but some of these may have come online since the book's publication. The book appeals more to a recreational genealogist than addicted ones.