Tales from Nowhere

This book gives nice short descriptions of lots of exciting places. It either inspires you to go, or, if you're lucky, awakens memories of exciting places you've been to yourself already!

You will visit far-flung places and some not-so with really interesting folk as your guide. The writing is consistantly high caliber and the tales descriptive, adventurous, engaging, enlightening, exciting, funny, warm-hearted and thought-provoking. The best verge on poetry and rival the best literature. What's great about this book is its accessiblity. Each story is short enough to finish within a few minutes which makes it a perfect take-along read. Perhaps on a journey of your own.

I bought this book in an overprized Amsterdam bookstore and was actually quite skeptical if it was worth the investment. After all, who wants to pay for blog-like stories printed on paperback? It was worth every cent. The stories are very well selected. One can only imagine the amount of travel tales the editors must have gone through before finding these outstanding pieces of travel writing. The stories - as you would expect from a Lonely Planet publication - come from the most bizarre corners of the globe, but it is not the exotic places but the interactions with the people that make this book special. Some of the stories resonate for days after putting down the book. The story of the guy who tries to write a book on SARS in China, travelling the country without finding much, and in the end loses everything almost has a Franz Kafka feeling about it. This book is a screaming buy. Go and get it.