You can try to run away from your life. You can pick a remote corner of paradise, max out your credit card, and tell nobody where you went. You can fly off to Mexico, stay in a hotel by the beach. They say saltwater cures everything. But your demons will find you. Chances are, they'll make friends with new demons along the way. And then, instead of hiding from the world, you'll be forced you confront your own internal chaos, and do the hard work you'd been trying to avoid. Stray Dogs and Lonely Beaches is a young woman's journey from Bucharest to New York, Cancun, and Paris, in the pursuit of the love that has eluded her all her life. Alina Ionescu inhabits a world that seems hostile, where dangers - real or imaginary - lurk at every turn, men are indifferent and elusive, and the relationships between women are fraught with jealousy, lack of compassion, and a whole minefield of hurt feelings and malicious gestures.