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[[Category:Travel|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Travel]]==Travel==__NOTOC__ <!-- Remove --> <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Gary BlackwoodAlastair Humphreys|title=The Great Race: The Amazing Round-The-World Auto Race Of 1908Local
|rating=5
|genre=Children's Non-FictionTravel |summary=In 1908Alastair Humphreys has walked and cycled all over the world. And then written about it. For this book he walked and cycled very close to home and then wrote about it. As he says in his introduction, Henry Fordthe book is an attempt 's Model T hadn't yet brought cars to the massesshare what I have learnt about some big issues from a year exploring a small map. The pioneers of the world of automobiles were experimenting Nature loss, pollution, land use and discovering just what access, agriculture, the car could dofood system, by driving right round the world. Except they didnrewilding…''t want to be pioneers. One of the competitors, Antonio Scarfogliojoys of the book for me was that the biggest thing he learned about all of these things was that there are no easy answers, put it so perfectly when he said no single 'right or wrong'We had set out to perpetuate an act of splendid folly, not that every upside is likely to open up have a new way downside for mensomebody and that there are some hard choices ahead. We wished to be madmen, not pioneers.'' Isn't that about the best quote you've ever read?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0810994895</amazonuk>1785633678
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dervla Murphy0957181167|title=Blue Skies and Boat Trips: The Island That Dared: Journeys in CubaNorfolk of Brian Lewis|author=Alan Marshall|rating=45|genre=TravelArt|summary=In her latest literary outingThere are few positive things which can be said about a substandard apartment when you’re on holiday but this time, the now elderly and increasingly opinionated travel writer and veteran cyclist Dervla Murphy describes a series of trips in trying to Cuba. The opening section deals with avoid looking at a family trip in late 2005. Readers who have followed Dervla's books from the beginning will have grown up with Rachel, the author's daughter, who accompanied her on problem I found myself looking more closely at a number couple of trips between pictures on the walls - and was completely taken by the ages work of five and eighteenBrian Lewis. Now Dervla travels with Rachel I searched online and Rachel's three young daughters, Clodagh, Rose could only find ‘used’ versions of this book and Zea, known for ease throughout the book as ''the Trio''print I wanted was ‘not available’. The middle section sees Dervla return alone to spend several months trekking in places such as the Sierra del Escambray mountains Oh, and in dear - then a few doors down from the final third of the bookapartment, Dervla returns to the city I found a gift shop with a stack of Santa Clara for the commemoration of the fortieth anniversary brand new books - and a framed print of the death of Ernesto ''Che'' Guevarapicture I wanted.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190601146X</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jonathan Buckley, Mark Ellingham and Tim Jepson1785633457|title=The Rough Guide to Tuscany and UmbriaCharging Around: Exploring the Edges of England by Electric Car|author=Clive Wilkinson
|rating=5
|genre=Travel
|summary=There's Clive Wilkinson has a general Rough Guide to Italy, but revisiting again this regional guide in the process history of writing up our trip to Tuscany two years ago, I was reminded of how good indeed this particular Rough Guide istravelling by unconventional means with a preference for slow travel. I bought it because I wanted to supplement As he neared his eightieth birthday the general Rough Guide to Italy I had with more detailed coverage idea of exploring the region edges of England in which we were going to spend the whole trip - and I an electric car was extremely happy with the resultnot totally outrageous.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1843530554</amazonuk>In fact, it should be a pleasant holiday for Clive and his wife, Joan, shouldn't it?
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Guy DelisleMerryn Glover|title=Pyongyang: A Journey in North KoreaThe Hidden Fires|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=Meet Guy. He's a French-Canadian animator, leaving home for a short stay in the capital of one of the world's most intriguing, unknown and alien cultures - Pyongyang, North Korea - so he can work on a TV cartoon co-production. Forced to stay in one of the three official hotels designed for foreigners, so that the locals and people such as he do not have to mix, he see glimpses of the unique socialist dictatorship, stunning views of the buildings forced through the poverty, and thousands of unreadable faces.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224079905</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Charley Boorman |title=Right to the Edge: Sydney to Tokyo by Any Means|rating=4
|genre=Travel
|summary=Forgive me if I'm wrongIt is always about the book, not the writer, but there seems a ever-diminishing sense of surprise with Charley Boormanare times when the author's continuing adventureshinterland is also the background to the book and so it is necessary to understand that context, in order to appreciate the book. One hopes at least they started with very daringMerryn Glover is of Australian parentage, courageouswas born in Kathmandu, envelope-pushing exploits, where we might have doubted his successgrew up in the Annapurna and Himalayan and now lives in Badenoch in Scotland. Now he's on his fifth trip I can think of no-one better a combination to give us a re-appraisal of Nan Shepherds work than the first Writer in as many years, BBC TV crew Residence in hand as alwaysthe Cairngorms National Park. Merryn walks, and we can hardly hope for not so much in the way shadow of an ordealShepherd, or doubt concerning a failurebut in her spirit. And, as he admits, this does feel much like an add-on for his Ireland-to-Sydney trekI think the two would have gotten along famously.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847443516</amazonuk>1846975751
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Rolf PottsB0B7289HKQ|title=VagabondingConversations Across America: An Uncommon Guide to A Father and Son, Alzheimer's, and 300 Conversations Along the TransAmerica Bike Trail that Capture the Art Soul of Long-Term World TravelAmerica|author=Kari Loya
|rating=4
|genre=Travel
|summary=Rolf Potts is Kari (that rhymes with ‘sorry’, by the way) wanted to spend some time with his father and the period between two jobs seemed like a travel writer as well as a bit of a backpacker guru and his book distils his experiences in, exactly as good time to do it. The decision was made to ride the title suggestsTrans America Bike Trail from Yorktown, ''an uncommon guide Virginia to longAstoria, Oregon -term travel''all 4250 miles of it - in 2015. The operative word here is ''uncommon'', They had 73 days to do it - slightly less than the recommended time - but there were factors which pointed this up as ''Vagabonding'' is not really a guide as we know them, more of a pepchallenge that it would be for most people who considered taking it on. Merv Loya was 75 years old and he was suffering from early-talk combined with a resource liststage Alzheimer's.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0812992180</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreview|author=Marika McAdam|title=Western Balkans (Lonely Planet Multi Country Guide) |rating=3.5|genre=Travel|summary=Lonely Planet does well from its multi-country guides as members of its peripatetic, Inter-railing, backpacker audience often 'do' more than one country (and sometimes a whole continent or region at least) within one trip.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1741047293</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Thomas Cook Publishing Erling Kagge|title=European Rail Timetable Summer 2009Walking: One Step At A Time
|rating=5
|genre=TravelLifestyle|summary=This volume Those who have read my reviews before will know that how much I loved a book is an absolutely essential resource for anybody travelling in Europe evidenced by train. A compilation the number of all major train routespages with corners turned, so let me start this one with an apology to the Norfolk Library Service: sorry! I forgot it allows was your book not only for checking train times but also planning pretty much every conceivable major journeymine. TheoreticallyIn my defence, the train timetables change twice yearly, so I will say that as a reader of this type of book there is something connective about noting where prior readers were inspired (provided itis subtle – I's worth getting an up ll allow creased corners, but not scribbles – for the latter we must buy our own copy – which I am about to date bookdo as soon as I have finished telling you why).|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848481322</amazonuk>}}
{{newreview|author=Sarah Johnstone |title=Europe on Erligg Kagge is a Shoestring: Big Trips on Small Budgets (Lonely Planet Shoestring Guides)|rating=4|genre=Travel|summary=''Europe on a Shoestring'' comes from Norwegian explorer who has walked to the South Pole, the vast stable of Lonely Planet's travel guides North Pole and is very much aimed at the budget end summit of the marketEverest. He knows a thing or two about walking. Comparable to its nearest competitorHowever, Letthis isn's Go Europet a travelogue about any of those epic journeys, it's is instead a one-volume backpacker bible which attempts thoughtful exploration of what it means to provide the overview walk. It is a plenitude of unnumbered essays about walking. There is no 'contents' page and I haven't counted. In small format paperback, each essay is only a whole continentfew pages long. Perhaps then, every single country and the main destinations in each better thought of the countriesas a meditation rather than an essay.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1741045916</amazonuk>0241357705
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Pete Brown Monica Connell|title=Hops and Glory: One Man's Search for the Beer That Built the British Empire|rating=4|genre=Travel|summary=Being a beer writer can't be the easiest route to respect in journalism. But with this book Pete Brown has done much to counter the sceptical, even dismissive, attitudes which must surround his trade and its subject matter. He has attempted to combine a history of British imperialism and the brewing industry with the comic 'quest' genre of travel writing. Against all the odds, he has largely succeeded.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230706355</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Rough Guides |title=The Rough Guide to Amsterdam|rating=4|genre=Travel|summary=This Rough Guide is as comprehensive, up to date and well researched as most if not all Rough Guides seem to be. I have used numerous examples of their guides and I found them to be among the best if not the best ones there are. They do seem to have moved upmarket a bit since I first started to use them in the early 90s - but they still provide the best balance in descriptions covering practicalities, context, history, sightseeing, entertainment, drinking, clubbing and even (in Amsterdam at least) dope smoking.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1843538091</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Alistair Duncan |title=Close to Holmes: A Look at the Connections Between Historical London, Sherlock Holmes and Sir Arthur Conan DoylePeacock Sky
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
|summary=Even today, London is a remarkable compromise of the old and the new. As Alistair Duncan shows in this volume, the city of Conan Doyle and Holmes has changed – yet not changed. There have been a handful of books in the past on 'Holmes's London', but this is the first of its kind to place equal emphasis on places associated with the detective and his creator.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312500</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Lucy Wadham
|title=The Secret Life of France
|rating=4
|genre=Travel
|summary=Monica Connell went to Nepal to do the fieldwork for her Ph.D. in social anthropology. Ithink it is important to know that. She went on a grant-supported trip, with a relatively specific objective. She wasn'm rather at t a loss hippy wanderer looking for Shangri-la. She wasn't a mere tourist passing through. She went with a fundamental aim of learning about these people and how they lived. She also went, presumably, with the academic discipline of how to describe this book for youfind these things out, how to organise them in her mind, how to "understand" them in the context of her own paradigms, and I'm still uncertain how to categorise it. It's part personal memoir keep enough notes and files and part analyticalphotos to help her create some greater sense of the experience after the event. Whether you regard this particular mix as brilliant or irritating is downFortunately, I supposeshe also went with a sense of open-ness and curiosity and a willingness to muck-in, to personal taste break her own rules and intellectual curiosityto truly connect with the people of the village where she hauled up.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0571236111</amazonuk>1780600429
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tim Fitzhigham Nicolas Bouvier|title=All at Sea: One Man. One Bathtub. One Very Bad Idea: Conquering the Channel in a Piece of Plumbing|rating=4.5|genre=Travel|summary=Once more my life is made easy by saying this book does just what it claims on the cover - takes a narrator of zesty, wacky humour, throws him into an unlikely situation (a bath) and gets him to do something unusual (row it across the Channel - and then beyond). This despite the fact he was the world's worst sculler at University.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848090269</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Keith Miller|title=St Peter's (Wonders of the World)|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=It is huge: not only in space but in time and structure; and in the non-material sphere of the complex interplay of meanings, symbols and significances. Miller's book, intentionally combining cultural and political history, art criticism and travel writing, manages to reflect that hugeness without weighting the reader down with too much austere detail.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861979088</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Guy Delisle|title=Burma The Japanese Chronicles|rating=4|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=What we have here are a male househusband and artist, and his MSF doctor wife, and their life in Burma or Myanmar for roughly a year. We get to see the life in the country, from the racks of bootleg software, to the animation class he leads, to their efforts to get into the lush country clubs, to their baby being adored by every passing girl. We see the state of the country, with its horrid drugs, HIV/AIDS and malaria problems, hidden beyond the gentle Buddhist retreats. We see the Delisles' interaction with this singular country - the censored press, and the fact that their road is only made more busy because of the roadblock diverting everyone away from Aung San Suu Kyi's house a block away.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224087711</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Iain McCalman|title=Darwin's Armada: Four Voyagers to the Southern Oceans and Their Battle for the Theory of Evolution|rating=3.5|genre=Biography|summary=A look at Darwin's journey on The Beagle, as well as journeys by Joseph Hooker, Thomas Huxley and Alfred Wallace. Darwin's Armada provides a broad overview that strikes a different tone to other books in a crowded market. Casual readers who usually steer clear of non-fiction will enjoy it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184737266X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Patrick Wright|title=A Journey Through Ruins: The Last Days of London |rating=4|genre=Politics and Society|summary=My good mood evaporated when Sue, my Bookbag partner, asked me if I'd read and review A Journey Through Ruins. She was right to ask because Thatcher's Britain is certainly an area of interest to me. The thing is, times are depressing enough. Margaret Hilda's neo-liberal legacy is crashing around us. Jobless queues are lengthening. Roofs are disappearing from over people's heads. The rampant cronyism and venal nature of our economic and political elites are slowly exposing themselves in ways likely to send my blood pressure soaring. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199541949</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Grann|title=The Lost City of Z: A Legendary British Explorer's Deadly Quest to Uncover the Secrets of the Amazon
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
|summary=For Lieutenant-Colonel Percy Fawcett there was more to the Amazonian jungle than El Dorado. His target was a treasure of a different nature – a lost city to be discovered because it was a city, not for any spurious material wealth it might hold. Could an entire civilisation have been founded in the inhospitable tracks of rain forest, and left remains he might find fame in locating? As this brilliant biography shows, Fawcett was the best man around to find it.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847374360</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Rachel Cusk
|title=The Last Supper: A Summer in Italy
|rating=4
|genre=Travel
|summary=SoIt never does to start a review of a book with a quote from the blurb, therebut sometimes it's unavoidable. Le Monde reviewed this familybook, rightat some point, and with the parents have itchy feet, so they pack everything up and say goodbye to words ''what the dog, and leave Clifton, Bristol, and drive down to Italy and live old master craftsmen would call a fine and different life, and masterpiece.'' It is precisely that. A masterpiece in the plumbing might not be sense of the best but craft as well as the neighbours and art of writing. I'm going to hesitate to call it 'travel writing' because this is as much a history of Japan, a mythology-primer for the scrumping and the wine are all Japanese culture as it is a personal response to die for living and it all comes right travelling in the end with life-affirming brilliance.  There will be many people shuddering at that completely false description of this bookcountry.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0571242561</amazonuk>1906011044
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Pip Cheshire and Patrick ReynoldsStephen Fabes|title=Architecture Uncooked: An Architect Looks Around New Zealand Holiday HousesSigns of Life
|rating=5
|genre=Travel
|summary=This book immediately impresses by its I was brought up on maps and first-person narratives of tales of far away places. I was birth-righted wanderlust and curiosity. Unfortunately, I didn't inherit what Dr. Stephen Fabes clearly written, yet intelligent writinghad which was the guts to simply go out and do it. I also didn't inherit the kind of steady nerve, ability to talk to strangers and its photography basic practicality that would have meant that captures both I would have survived if I had been gifted with the structure and requisite 'bottle'. In order words I'm not the spirit sort of the holiday homes scattered around the New Zealand countrysideperson who will get on a bike outside a London hospital and not come home for six years. Fabes did precisely that.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1869621549</amazonuk>1788161211
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Dean StarnesRob Baker|title=RoamToubab Tales: The Joys and Trials of Expat Life in Africa
|rating=4
|genre=Travel
|summary=Languages, customs, rituals, fascinating things ''"Go to doMali, places to see" they said. "The music is amazing, people to visit – all in the one book, covering almost " they said. "And you get ten hours of sunshine every nook and cranny throughout the worldday. This is a travel book covering, well, pretty well everything" So I did.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1869507118</amazonuk>}}''
{{newreview|author=Tim Moore|title=I Believe in Yesterday: My Adventures in Living History|rating=4|genre=Humour|summary=Common opinion has it that the television programme Rob Baker is an ethnomusicologist. ''Time TeamA what?'' did a lot for the public image of archaeologists – bringing them out of their holes I hear you cry. Well, an ethnomusicologist studies music in the groundrelation to culture, and making them seem so rather like exciting, interesting people with a good way of putting their knowledge across. However it was clearly a much harder task when it came folklorist studies the oral and written story traditions relating to those background artistes they have sometimes, walking up and down in Roman centurion gear, or living the historical lifestyle as a re-enactmentculture.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224077813</amazonuk>B089CSNFT7
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Brian W Pugh and Paul R SpiringChristine Brown|title=On the Trail of Arthur Conan DoyleBucket Showers and Baby Goats: An Illustrated Devon Tour|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=This slim volume, comprising just four chapters, is both a detailed chronology of the life of Arthur Conan Doyle and, for those that want to follow Volunteering in the footsteps of ACD (I adopt the authors' abbreviation gladly), 'The Complete Arthur Conan Doyle Devon Tour' – locations that inspired The Hound of the Baskervilles and more.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846241987</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=William Gray|title=Adventure Travel (AA Travel Guides)West Africa|rating=4|genre=Travel|summary=Last Friday, my local branch of Cotswold Outdoor had several travel guides and physical activity handbooks on the shelves, but nothing similar to this book, a compendium of physically active travel, with some nods to responsible tourism. The format of information on activities, well-written taster articles and plenty of attractive photos make for an inspiring armchair read for dreamers and planners. 'World class' locations are always debatable, but I found interesting suggestions in several sections. I loved the book enough to brush off the toast crumbs so that I can present it to one of my adventurous offspring this Christmas, but I'm very much afraid the easy-opening pages may give the game away!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749555815</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Daniel Everett|title=Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes|rating=5
|genre=Travel
|summary=I nearly didn't select In the summer of 2008, this book to review as I thought it 's author was spending her days working in an office job in the USA while spending her nights dreaming about snakes - I was expecting some kind of Bear Grylls* adventure travel survival book for the Amazonbeing somewhere else, doing something else. How-to-survive-Long story short, she ended up volunteering in-the-jungle-armed-with-only-a-sharp-stick-and-a-six-pack sort of thingGhana, West Africa. FortunatelyNow coincidentally, I looked into in the content a little furthersummer of 2010, and found that this is review's author was spending ''her'' days working in an anthropological and linguistic study of the life of the Pirahas, a tribe living office job (albeit in the remote Amazonian jungle. The title comes from the fact that the Pirahas donUK) while spending 't have a word for 'her'goodnight'nights dreaming about being somewhere else, doing something else, and ' – their nearest equivalent when they are leaving someone for the night is 'she'Don't Sleepended up just 3 countries away, There Are Snakes''volunteering in Sierra Leone, West Africa. So you can see why, when this book came up, said reviewer was delighted to have the opportunity to read and critique it.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846680301</amazonuk>171024299X
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Paul TherouxMourby_Rooms|title=Ghost Train to the Eastern StarRooms with a View: The Secret Life of Great Hotels|author=Adrian Mourby
|rating=4
|genre=Travel
|summary=Some 30-odd years ago Paul TherouxAdrian Mourby has given us a flying visit to each of fifty grand hotels, then half from fourteen regions of the world, with the age he is nowhotels in each section being arranged chronologically rather than by region, travelled overland across Europe and Asiawhich helps to give something of an overall picture. The result was So what makes a hotel 'his best known bookgrand' (apparently) – ? The first hotel to call itself 'grand'was in Covent Garden in 1774 and it ushered in the beginning of a period when a hotel would be a lifestyle choice rather than a refuge for those without friends and family conveniently nearby. The Great Railway Bazaar''hotels we visit all began life in different circumstances and each faced a different set of challenges. We begin in the Americas, move to the United Kingdom, circumnavigate Europe, briefly visit Russia and Turkey then northern Africa, India and Asia. Australia, it seems, does not go for the grand.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241142539</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Martin Buckley1908745819|title=An Indian OdysseySurfacing|author=Kathleen Jamie
|rating=5
|genre=TravelHistory|summary=More than Sometimes when people suggest that you read a quarter of a century ago Martin Buckley went to Sri Lanka and then on to India. It was time off before settling down to the business of earning a living. Two things happened to him – he fell in love with India and knew that he wanted to stay there - and he discovered the certain book, they tell you ''Ramayanathis one has your name on it''. ValmikiMostly we take them at their word, or not, but rarely do we ask them why they thought so unless it turns out that we didn's epic was written round about 500 to 700 BC – much t like the same time as Homerbook. That's ''Odyssey'' (the title of this book is a very clever play on words) – but it still holds rare experience. People who are sensitive to hearing a central place in the hearts and minds of Indians although book calling your name, rarely get it is strangely unknown in the Westwrong. In this case, I was told why. ''Ramayana'' – The Wanderings blurb speaks of Rama – tells the story of Lord Ramaauthor considering ''s search for his kidnapped wife and his subsequent battles with Ravan. Much of it is certainly myth. Some may well be based on factan older, but it's inspirational and has achieved the status less tethered sense of Holy Writherself.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091925762</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Stephen Clarke |title=A Year in the Merde|rating=5|genre=General Fiction|summary=''A Year In The Merde Older. Less tethered. That'' was recommended to me by s not a friend whose sense bad description of humour is very much on a par with minewhere I am. I read it a couple of years ago and decided, on discovering that Stephen Clarke had written a couple of not-Add to-be-missed follow-ups, that I would treat myself to the tale once more as a warm-up exercise to prepare me for the ''beaucoup de merde'' to come.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552772968</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Fran Sandham|title=Traversa|rating=5|genre=Travel|summary=When you reach the end my love of Fran Sandham's solo walk across Africa, as he finally dips his toe into the Indian Oceannatural world, you need to go back to of those aspects of the beginning poetic and start again.  Lots of books make you want to do lyrical that. In this case, you actually need to: in order to fully understand the manare about style not form, and so many substance most of the things he says and does along the wayall, about connection. OtherwiseOf course, you're in danger of thinking this guy book had my name on it. It was a fool written for even trying me. It would have found its way to me eventually. I am pleased to attempt a solo walk across the African continenthave it fall onto my path so quickly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0715637673</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Christina Thompson1912242052|title=Come on Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You AllO Joy for me!|author=Keir Davidson|rating=4.53|genre=TravelArt|summary=Subtitled ''an unlikely love storyOh Joy for me!''gives Coleridge credit for being ''the first person to walk the mountains alone, this was an interesting and inspiring memoir written by an American academicnot because he had to for work, who met and fell in love with as a Maori miner, quarryman, shepherd or pack- horse driver, but because he wanted to for pleasure and what a beautiful tale it tells! Referred to as a 'contact' encounter (i.eadventure. His rapturous encounters with their natural beauty, chance meeting) it sounds almost like a fairy taleand its literary consequences, and in part it is - but a fairy tale which includes huge amount changed our view of hard work toothe world''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747582521</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nicola J Watson Woolf_Great|title=The Literary TouristGreat Horizon: 50 Tales of Exploration|author=Jo Woolf
|rating=3.5
|genre=TravelHistory|summary=''As Jo Woolf has compiled a brilliant set of fifty short insights into the lives and achievements of some amazingly brave people. Their fearless journeys have helped us unlock many of the mysteries of the wildest parts of our resident travel writer this might interest you…'' came my introduction world, and also given us an understanding of what it is like to this be faced with the most terrible conditions and still have the determination and grit to carry on. This book. Misguidedly could be viewed as it turned a taster which encourages us to seek out, for the emphasis in Watson's work is much and read more heavily on about some of the ''literary'' than on the ''tourist''most iconic explorers. Their stories are pretty incredible and Woolf does them justice.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230210929</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Suzanna Clarke Hailstone_Berlin|title=A House Berlin in Fezthe Cold War: Building a Life in the Ancient Heart of Morocco1959 to 1966|author=Allan Hailstone
|rating=4
|genre=AutobiographyHistory|summary=Perhaps it's a little unfair to come to ''A House Berlin in Fezthe Cold War: 1959-1966'' still inspired contains almost 200 photographs taken by author/photographer Allan Hailstone in his visits to the city during this period. The images provide an insight into the storytelling changing nature of Tahir Shah's [[In Arabian Nights by Tahir Shah|In Arabian Nights]], because this is the divide between East and West Berlin and a very different take on Morocco, aimed (as a book) no doubt at a very different market, but reading glimpse into life in the city during the two in quick succession it is hard to avoid comparisonCold War.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091925223</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Paul Richardson Stewart_Marches|title=A Late Dinner: Discovering the Food of SpainThe Marches|author=Rory Stewart
|rating=5
|genre=Travel
|summary=Although subtitled ''discovering the food of Spain'', this excellently written, engaging and interesting book is about so much more. Yes, the focus is on food, mouthwateringly described, but it is also about culture, people, travel, tourism, history and geography.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747593809</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Rowan Simons
|title=Bamboo Goalposts
|rating=4
|genre=Sport
|summary=When it comes to football, I'm in agreement with the great Bill Shankly when he said: ''Football is not a matter of life and death, it's far more important than that''. When it comes to China, my knowledge is limited to what I've seen on the TV recently about the earthquake, the Olympics and the protests; vague memories of Tiananmen Square and a love of the cuisine, or at least the version that comes from my local takeaway. Like many in the Western world, I have no concept of what life is truly like in China.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230703720</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Tahir Shah
|title=In Arabian Nights
|rating=5
|genre=Travel
|summary=Once upon a time there was a traveller who travelled through Pakistan to visit far Afghanistan, where he would seek out the lost treasure of the Mughals. Sadly the traveller had an English passport and a Muslim name, and he was travelling from one enemy state to another. His story was not believed.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0385612079</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Daniel Kalder
|title=Strange Telescopes
|rating=3
|genre=Travel
|summary=''Bill Bryson with Tourette's'' was one of the epithets that met Kalder's previous travelogue ([[Lost Cosmonaut]]) along with 'sharp absurdist insight', 'deliberately crass' and 'revelatory'. I can't actually disagree with any of that if you were to apply it to the latest offering ''Strange Telescopes''.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571231233</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=John Mole
|title=I Was a Potato Oligarch: Travels and Travails in the New Russia
|rating=1
|genre=Travel
|summary=I remember getting this book in post, reading the title and thinking no, even though I am Russian, I will try to be unbiased and judge it like I would judge any other book about a foreign country experience. I now have to regretfully admit I failed. In my defence, John Mole's focus on mocking the nation and country made that all too easy.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1857885090</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Sun Shuyun
|title=A Year in Tibet
|rating=4
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=Tibet is an emotive word these days. Rightly so.
 
Since long before the dawn of Communism, China has been adept at numbering the rights and wrongs of history, with the three this and the seven that. Sadly, she does not yet see the invasion of Tibet as a wrong. I am in no position to know what the majority of ordinary Chinese know about Tibet, nor what they think of their government's official standpoint on it. Along with many others, I can only hope that one day they will have full and free access to the internet and other media where they will be able to read the many and varied opinions of people from around the world, and will be allowed not only to make up their own mind – but to then debate that standpoint, publicly and freely.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007265115</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Fuchsia Dunlop
|title=Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-sour Memoir of Eating in China
|rating=5
|genre=Cookery
|summary=On her first trip to the orient Fuchsia Dunlop is appalled at the preserved duck eggs served as hors d'oeuvre in Hong Kong. Her description of this first encounter with the Chinese delicacy is rich with words like filthy, revolting, nightmarish, translucent, oozy, mouldy, toxic, slime…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091918308</amazonuk>
}}
 
 
{{newreview
|author=Nicholas Murray
|title=A Corkscrew is Most Useful: The Travellers of Empire
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=The British EmpireObserver quote on the front of the paperback edition of Stewart's latest book observes ''This is travel writing at its finest.'' Perhaps, lawd bless but to call it – so large the sun never set on 'travel writing' is to totally under-sell it. Also never resting upon This is erudition at its surface, if finest. Stewart has the background to do this book is anything to go by, was : he had an increasing spread of international upbringing and followed his father in both the Army and the moneyed classesForeign Office, gallivanting off and then (to all cornershis father's, bemusement, whether as imperial missionariesshall we say) became an MP. Oh, explorersand he walked 6, or just plain travellers000 miles across Afghanistan in 2002. A walk along the Scottish borders should be a doddle by comparison.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0316731048</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Gimlette Bristow China|title=Panther SoupChina in Drag: A European Journey in War and Peace Travels with a Cross-dresser|author=Michael Bristow
|rating=4
|genre=TravelAutobiography|summary=In 1945Having worked for nine years in Bejing as a journalist for the BBC, Americans came in their millions author Michael Bristow decided to liberate a Europe smashed by warwrite about Chinese history. It was a movement of men and machinery on a scale never seen before. Many men died; more are dying off today. Sixty Having been learning the local language for several years on, travel writer John Gimlette chanced upon Bristow asked his language teacher for guidance - the language teacher, born in the early fifties, offered Bristow a survivor compelling picture of life in Communist China - but added to that campaign. His meeting prompted a decision to retrace the GIs' progress through France, Austria and Germany Bristow was greatly surprised to try and relive those events, and to discover what remains of them todayfind that his language teacher also enjoyed spending his spare time in ladies clothing. ''Panther Soup'' It soon becomes clear that the tale told here is immensely personal - yet also paints a fascinating portrait of one of the story of that journeyworld's most intriguing nations.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091921384</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=George Saunders Hurst_Norfolk|title=The Brain-dead Megaphone|rating=4.5|genre=Humour|summary=American author George Saunders is known for his short stories and fiction, but he is also a journalist for publications such as ''The Guardian'', ''The New Yorker Magazine'' and ''GQ''. ''The Brain-Dead Megaphone'' is his first collection of essays and it's an interesting propositionOn My Way: sixteen pieces ranging from travel writing, literary appreciation, political essays, to surrealist short fiction.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747594260</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewNorfolk Coastal Walks|author=Geert Mak |title=The BridgeJohn Hurst|rating=4.5|genre=HistoryArt|summary=The current Galata Bridge in Instanbul is It was pure serendipity: after a concrete structure less than 15 years old. A bascule bridge of some 490mfive-hour drive, we were, it carries a four-lane highwayannoyingly, a tramway and pedestrian walkways on its open upper deck left with arcaded market areas beneath on an hour to fill in Blakeney before we could have the outer spans. At first sight it has little keys to recommend itour holiday cottage. None of There was an art exhibition in the grandeur church hall, so we went in - and found a display of the Charles Bridge in Praguemost gorgeous pictures. I'd cheerfully have bought every one and hung them on our walls, nor the ostentation but thought that I would have to make do with a couple of Tower Bridge in London, nor even the elegance of the Golden Gategreetings cards when I saw ''On My Way: Norfolk Coastal Walks'' and I couldn't resist buying it. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846551382</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview|author=Tom Fort |title=Downstream: Across England in a Punt|rating=3.5|genre=Travel|summary=In summer 2005, journalist and angler Tom Fort set off to follow the river Trent from its source near Stoke to its confluence with the Humber. ''Downstream'' is the aptly meandering story of his 170-mile trip. Travelling light, first Move on foot, then in a purpose-built 15-foot plywood punt, and finishing off on a bike, Fort traces the course of the river, surveying the towns and landscapes it shaped, and exploring the history which surrounds it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184605169X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview |title=Blood River|author=Tim Butcher|genre=Travel|rating=5|summary=Tim Butcher started working as a journalist in Africa in 2000…15 years after Live Aid gave us all hope that maybe the continent’s problems were solvable…and almost as long since we’d begun to realise that it wasn’t going to be that easy. Two years into the bloodiest war in the world, the Congo – at the very heart of Africa – was seeing 1,000 deaths a day to the violence. And the world wasn’t even looking. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099494280</amazonuk>}} {{newreview |title=Lessons From The Land Of Pork Scratchings|author=Greg Gutfeld|genre=Travel|rating=4.5|summary=Greg Gutfeld came to England to take up a job as editor of a men’s mag. Leaving New York as a stressed yet slim high-achiever, he soon settles into life in the UK and embraces a new world where the food is crap and the beer lukewarm, but where the people seem remarkably laid back and happy nonetheless. Two years later he leaves to return to his homeland, somewhat heavier and generally less fit than when he arrived, but with a newfound understanding of the secret of happiness, which weirdly has nothing to do with herpes (see chapter 66). |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847370667</amazonuk>}}[[Newest Trivia Reviews]]