Geri Halliwell-Horner on Why She All the time Visits a Bookstore Whereas Touring

Geri Halliwell-Horner might finest be often called the Spice Ladies’ Ginger Spice, however her true woman energy trait is her fearless curiosity with which she explores the world—and it is a high quality that turns out to be useful throughout her international travels. 

“I am Miss Curious,” the singer, creator, actress, and mom of two stated to Journey + Leisure on a name final month. “I do not care what it’s. I feel all the pieces’s attention-grabbing.”

She actually leaned into her intrepid spirit with Rainbow Girl, a present that launched on YouTube in 2020. Within the sequence, she went on a “woman energy journey of discovery” and experimented with all the pieces from beekeeping to tenting. Some issues she, admittedly, preferred greater than others.

“I really assume tenting is sort of suffocating whenever you’ve bought that canvassing over your head,” she stated. “I discovered it a bit claustrophobic.”

As an alternative, she prefers a easy various: making camp within the open, like she as soon as did within the Arabian Desert outdoors of Dubai. “I sat on the high of this hill of sand and appeared up on the evening sky, and it was flooded with diamonds,” she stated. “The celebrities appeared so near me. It was essentially the most enchanting factor.”

Halliwell-Horner by no means shies away from an journey, and she or he’s completely at dwelling with a low-key getaway, like sipping tea by the ocean, in addition to extra intense undertakings, akin to mountaineering. A few of her favourite journey recollections embody a hike on Cape City’s Desk Mountain, in addition to an ascent up an Austrian peak the place she bumped into an surprising snowstorm.

“It was a vivid sunny day, so I went up in my shorts, however by the point I bought to the highest, there was a snowstorm!” she stated. “There was slightly hut, and the person there gave us some good scorching meals, however we bought caught within the blizzard.” 

However, as Halliwell-Horner put it, all the difficulty was price it ultimately. “I wrote a superb track afterward,” she stated.

The British icon is finest identified for her time as a pop star, however she’s a profitable creator as nicely. Her younger grownup fantasy novel, “Rosie Frost & the Falcon Queen,” landed on the New York Occasions Greatest Sellers record in 2023. She says she typically makes use of her journeys as a supply of inspiration.

“I’ve been writing for therefore lengthy, so an thought may be for a track, which is sort of like a espresso espresso shot,” Halliwell-Horner stated. “For a guide, it is a feast to make you’re feeling the ability of phrases.”

For instance, she has a fascination with Tresco, an island positioned 28 miles off the Cornish coast in southwest England. The island has a singular subtropical microclimate, which helped spark the thought of Bloodstone Island, a Jurassic Park-like place crammed with endangered species. In the meantime, a go to to Mount Fuji fueled the plot of the second guide of her sequence, “Rosie Frost: Ice on Fireplace,” accessible on the market as of April 8.

In the course of the writing course of, concepts popped up throughout all factors of her travels, even mid-flight. “For this guide, I wrote down concepts on the evacuation directions at the back of the seat pocket and a sick bag as a result of I simply didn’t need to overlook it,” she stated. “I’m at all times taking notes and writing issues down. I don’t even understand I’m doing it.”

Nonetheless, this is not Halliwell-Horner’s first go-round with being a profitable creator. Whereas selling her first guide sequence, Ugenia Lavender, she toured all throughout the U.S. and at all times made certain to make a cease at her favourite form of retailer in each metropolis: a bookshop.

“It is nearly like I want an grownup to seize me by the scruff of the neck to tug me away since I begin all the opposite books considering, ‘Oh, that appears attention-grabbing,’” she stated. Halliwell-Horner provides that she nearly at all times has a guide on her, and she or he’s normally in the course of 4 totally different books of assorted genres at any time.

She loves visiting bookstores when she’s dwelling within the U.Okay., too. One in every of her favorites is Daunt Books in Marylebone, which she stated is a must-visit for all guide lovers. She particularly loves second-hand bookshops as nicely. “Dusty previous books have a humorous scent about them that I discover fairly comforting,” she stated.

To Halliwell-Horner, journey and studying are inherently linked—they’re each transformational in nature. “If you happen to’ve traveled the world, you have at all times bought a guide on you,” she stated. “Typically, our minds turn out to be like a muddy pond of stagnant, muddied water, however for those who really clear it out, you already know precisely what’s best for you.”

That form of change fuels the plot of “Ice on Fireplace,” which is ready throughout a volcanic eruption—a metaphor for private progress and the ability of issues past our management.

“Typically we’re that exploding volcano that is going to erupt, after which generally it is the peaceable, stunning ocean,” she stated. “What I like about journey is that it’s a battle between science and nature, man versus Mom Nature. Who’s in cost? Once I journey, I get my reply proper in entrance of me. The roar of the ocean, the tumbling huge rocks thundering down the facet of a mountain—that is who’s in cost!”