I had a business trip to Suzhou and Shanghai and was too ambitious about how much reading time I had, which is why I started River Town in China but finished it in Singapore. River Town is a memoir of Hessler’s two years in Fuling, a small town on the Yangtze river. Hessler was there… Read More Book Review: River Town by Peter Hessler
What do you think about when you travel? If you’re like me, you’re probably just thinking about how to optimise your trip (for me, it’s finding a bookshop and a teashop no matter where so I can get a book and try some tea). But whenever I see articles about the problem of over-tourism or… Read More Book Review: The New Tourist by Paige McClanahan
The first time I tied a memory to a song, I did it by accident. It was my first trip to Japan and my first trip overseas without my family. I was fifteen and it was 2008. In other words, I had just graduated from bringing one of those portable CD players around to bringing… Read More Soundtrack of My Life
I have been following Joanna Penn for a while as her podcast on being a self-published author is one of the biggest podcasts within the subgenre. When I heard she was holding a Kickstarter for a new book – one themed around travel – I was instantly intrigued. And it didn’t hurt that the Kickstarter… Read More Kickstarter Book Review: Pilgrimage by J.F. Penn
Is there such thing as a “happiest place on earth?” (no, not Disneyland) In The Geography of Bliss, Eric Weiner travels to both the supposedly sad and happy countries in the world in order to find out what the secret of happiness is. The countries are: Netherlands (for research) Switzerland (supposedly very happy) Bhutan (for… Read More Book Review: The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner
As a non-British person (although I’m from a former British colony), I must admit to not knowing much about Middle England, or even having much of an impression what it was. So it was pretty surprising to realise that I’ve visited, and even lived in, some of the places mentioned in Adventures on the High… Read More Adventures on the High Teas by Stuart Maconie
I picked up this book on the basis of its subtitle “Journey through the dark ages”. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m currently listening to two history-related podcasts; one on the history of Britain and one on the history of the English language. The podcasts do go into the Middle Ages (I’m there right now) and… Read More In the Land of Giants by Max Adams
I found this while browsing through the travel guides at the library and it sounded like a unique way to get to know the Lake District. The whole premise is that the writer and his son spend nine days cycling around the Lake District. It’s not a place that’s new to them, but it’s a… Read More A Lake District Grand Tour by Mike Carden
I picked this up because, as I’ve probably mentioned before, I have a family vacation coming up (I am definitely not going to be able to shut up about this) and while part of my preparation is figuring where to go, another part is figuring how I’m going to tell stories about my trip when… Read More Lonely Planet’s Guide to Travel Writing by Don George