In September 2013 Tony Collins took advantage of a long-overdue sabbatical to walk the 490 miles of the Camino, from the French border to Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain. For decades he had helped to provide the evangelical churches of the world with reading material. Now he was deliberately stepping out of his comfort zone: a pilgrimage, carrying his pack, through a land whose language he did not speak, into a religious culture far removed from his own, in search of sources of reverence. He would not walk alone: the Way has many adherents, well over 200,000 completing their Camino during that year. He had expected the Way to be arduous, and so it proved. But he had not expected so bracing an internal journey, his battered soul laid down for examination, past errors offered up for scrutiny. Nor had he expected such moments of intense spiritual encounter; nor so many precious friendships. He discovered, above all, as have many before him, that the Road leaves an indelible mark.

One man's pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, in search of holiness.

About the Author
Tony Collins has spent more than fourty years publishing books and magazines, and has started several imprints including Monarch Books. He is the author of Taking My God for a Walk: A publisher on pilgrimage.

Reviews
"Tony's pilgrimage challenges on all levels - from aching feet and exhaustion to the deep longing within him to connect soul to soul with the God he loves. This book will move and inspire you." -- Pam Rhodes
"Engagingly insightful, endearingly witty, and wholly honest, this account of Tony's adventure will whet your appetite, as it has mine, to embark on your own pilgrimage into self-discovery and deeper richness of life." -- Simon Guillebaud
"Tony Collins' new book is an absolute delight. We take not one walk with him, but two, and both are a genuine pleasure. Here is a man who stands at the verge of retirement, who looks back and forward, and does so with both reverence and great good humour. There was so much quiet passion contained within these pages, and so many powerful lessons. Highly recommended." -- Davis Bunn, bestselling author
"Reading Tony Collins's tale of thirty-two days upon pilgrimage provides a reader with much of the experience of the journey, except for aching knees and blisters. Tony began the trek hoping to `put myself in a situation where, if God were inclined to speak to me, I would be in a state of mind to listen.' It becomes apparent as the book ends that this did indeed happen. If one cannot make the pilgrimage to San Juan de Compostela, reading TAKING MY GOD FOR A WALK is an excellent substitute." -- Mel Starr, author of The Unquiet Bones
"Veteran British publisher Tony Collins calls us to join him along the famous Camino pilgrimage path, guiding us through its beautiful, gritty, punishing terrain. Joy, pain, regret, discovery - you experience them all on a journey like this." -- Sheridan Voysey, writer, speaker, broadcaster
"A beautifully-crafted, hope-laden invitation to us all to put on our walking boots." -- Malcolm Duncan, author and speaker
"A truly wonderful book: part travelogue, part history, part journal. Tony writes with wit, charm and intelligence, and above all, honesty." -- Andy Bannister, author of The Atheist Who Didn't Exist
"This is a pilgrimage on paper. The words are like the whisper of God on the evening breeze. The images painted are like glimpses of the dawn after a long night. Tony's pilgrimage is that of a man who is learning to fall upwards, in the words of Richard Rohr. You hear the depth of his faith and the yearning of a heart that knows God is so much bigger than any of our limited notions of him and so much more beautiful than our most beautiful thoughts and ideas of him." -- Malcolm Duncan



Book Information
ISBN 9780857217738
Author Tony Collins
Format Paperback
Page Count 256
Imprint Monarch Books
Publisher SPCK Publishing