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Raluca’s Year In Books

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565 books | 865 friends

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2026 Reading Challenge

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Raluca Barbu (Marchis)

Goodreads Author

Born

in Pitesti, Romania

Website

https://ralucabarbu.ro/

Genre

Travel, Fiction, Nonfiction

Member Since

May 2013

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Raluca Barbu (formerly Marchiș) is a published author in Romania who relocated to the United States in 2019. She now lives with her daughter and husband in Illinois. Apart from writing, she has worked for over fifteen years in sales, public relations, and marketing for some of Romania's most influential companies. She currently works as an Adult Programming Specialist for an area public library in the Northwestern suburbs of Chicago.

Books by the same author:

• Oraşul din viaţa mea (My City Within), a memoir on surviving life as a YA. Grinta Publishing House, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2007
• Corporatistul (The Corporate Man), a novel about losing and finding oneself while working for a multinational corporation. Tracus Arte Publishing House, Buc Raluca Barbu (formerly Marchiș) is a published author in Romania who relocated to the United States in 2019. She now lives with her daughter and husband in Illinois. Apart from writing, she has worked for over fifteen years in sales, public relations, and marketing for some of Romania's most influential companies. She currently works as an Adult Programming Specialist for an area public library in the Northwestern suburbs of Chicago.

Books by the same author:

• Oraşul din viaţa mea (My City Within), a memoir on surviving life as a YA. Grinta Publishing House, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2007
• Corporatistul (The Corporate Man), a novel about losing and finding oneself while working for a multinational corporation. Tracus Arte Publishing House, Bucharest, Romania, 2012
• Selfie în oglindă. Când femeia devine mamă (Selfie In the Mirror: When a Woman Becomes a Mother), a non-fiction book on motherhood. Herald Publishing House, Bucharest, Romania, 2014
She has also written for LaPunkt.ro as a movie critic, for Apostrof, the Romanian Writers’ Union magazine, and Acribia, the Librarianship College paper in Cluj-Napoca, Romania (back in the 2000s). For five consecutive years, she wrote social and cultural pieces on her own platform, ralucabarbu.ro, which later became her fourth book, Terapie prin scris (Writing Therapy).

Her latest book, American Vacation. 12,000 Miles Into the Wild West is a travel book about the United States and its most iconic Western landmarks, seen through the eyes of a Romanian writer. It is in many respects one-of-a-kind because no other Romanian author has traveled and written about the American West. It provides a foreign writer’s take on the American landscape and tourism through the eyes of a former citizen of a communist country. It is a homage given both to the beauty of the American outdoors and to the way nature is respected and preserved by the authorities and visitors. What makes it special though is the travel narrative that Raluca has brought back as a literary genre. In a world of Google reviews, travel blogs, and vacation guides, she manages to shine a light on the lost art of travel memoirs.
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Raluca Barbu (Marchis)’s books

Average rating: 3.98 · 97 ratings · 14 reviews · 6 distinct works • Similar authors

	American Vacation. 12,000 Miles Into the Wild West 3.98 avg rating — 45 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Corporatistul 4.18 avg rating — 17 ratings — published 2012	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Selfie în oglindă. Când femeia devine mamă 3.88 avg rating — 17 ratings — published 2014	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Vacanță americană. 20.000 de km în vestul sălbatic 4.71 avg rating — 7 ratings — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Terapie prin scris 2.88 avg rating — 8 ratings — published 2018	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Orasul din viata mea 4.67 avg rating — 3 ratings — published 2007	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Raluca Barbu (Marchis)'s Blog

The Joy of Surprising Oneself

It is the first time in my adult life that even the thought of spring exhausts me. I have written so many praises of spring, all in a pleading voice, asking it to materialize from the remnants of winter and save me from a colorless and silent world. I have always craved life manifesting around…

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Raluca is Currently Reading

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Brooke Shields Is Not Allowed to Get Old: Thoughts on Aging as a Woman

by Brooke Shields

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The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

by John Koenig

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Three Minutes for Mom: 365 Days of Empowerment, Encouragement, and Growth for a More Connected Motherhood

by Erin Morrison

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Oct 10, 2025 11:31AM

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“Cherish your wilderness.”
― Maxine Kumin

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“The solution was to write my way out of the problem. That meant writing early in the morning, late at night, and on weekends. It meant carving out time, claiming it for myself. I thought: I will write this first book, and then maybe another after that. This is the thing I want to do.”
― Jami Attenberg, I Came All This Way to Meet You: Writing Myself Home

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“There are plenty of reasons why I write. This is just one of them. The sense that I want to own something, own my work, own my creativity, own my name. It is perhaps not the purest reason, not truest of heart, for there is some ego attached to it. But it is real.”
― Jami Attenberg, I Came All This Way to Meet You: Writing Myself Home

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“I'd been afraid I'd somehow been giving a life I hadn't deserved, but that's ridiculous. We don't deserve anything - not the suffering and not the golden light. It just comes.”
― Ann Patchett, These Precious Days: Essays

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“I can't imagine what kind of work it would take to actually put the past in order.”
― Ann Patchett, These Precious Days: Essays

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