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Shop nowA Train through Time
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Learn moreHow much of our memory is constructed by imagination? And how does memory shape our lives? As a nine-year old, Elizabeth Farnsworth struggled to understand the loss of her mother. On a cross-country trip with her father, the heartsick child searches for her mother at train stations along the way. Even more, she confronts mysteries: death, time, and a mysteriously locked compartment on the train.
Weaving a child’s experiences with memories from reporting in danger zones like Cambodia and Iraq, Farnsworth explores how she came to cover mass death and disaster. While she never breaks the tone of a curious investigator, she easily moves between her nine-year-old self and the experienced journalist. Imagination is at play in her childhood adventures and in her narrative control, always with great purpose. She openly confronts the impact of her childhood on the route her life has taken. And, as she provides one beautifully crafted depiction after another, we share her journey, coming to know the acclaimed reporter as she discovers herself. Farnsworth’s curiosity lingers on every page of A Train through Time: A Life, Real and Imagined, and so does the making of a powerfully driven woman.
Elizabeth Farnsworth is a filmmaker, foreign correspondent, and former chief correspondent and principal substitute anchor of PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. Her 2008 documentary, The Judge and the General, codirected with Patricio Lanfranco, aired on television around the world, winning many awards. She has reported from Cambodia, Vietnam, Chile, Haiti, Iraq, and Iran, among other places. She grew up in Topeka, Kansas, where her ancestors were pioneers. She has a BA from Middlebury College and an MA in history from Stanford University. She lives in Berkeley, California, with her husband, attorney Charles E. Farnsworth.
Elizabeth Farnsworth is a filmmaker, foreign correspondent, and former chief correspondent and principal substitute anchor of PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. Her 2008 documentary, The Judge and the General, codirected with Patricio Lanfranco, aired on television around the world, winning many awards. She has reported from Cambodia, Vietnam, Chile, Haiti, Iraq, and Iran, among other places. She grew up in Topeka, Kansas, where her ancestors were pioneers. She has a BA from Middlebury College and an MA in history from Stanford University. She lives in Berkeley, California, with her husband, attorney Charles E. Farnsworth.
Reviews
“It has been a long time since I read a book so moving, plain spoken, and beautiful. The instant I finished it, I went back to the beginning and started in again.”
“A small jewel of graceful writing, insightful observing, and memorable reading.”
“[Farnsworth is] such an able storyteller and her tale of loss, suffused with a child’s desire to attach meaning and reasoning to death, is so universal.”
“Piecing together fragments of the past in this often moving memoir helps the author understand how she ‘found relief from self and sorrow by concentrating on the lives of others.’”
“In this book, Elizabeth Farnsworth lays bare the genesis of the caring heart that has so infused her stellar reporting.”
“A unique, moving, and thought-provoking portrait of Elizabeth’s Farnsworth’s years as a foreign correspondent.”
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