audiobooks

I bought this book to get a better idea of what is considered the best in travel writing...and looking back I don't think I was considering it a serious genre, but was rather expecting the sort of self-indulgent, tourist-oriented, glamorized type of article you might find in the average Conde Nast publication. But, with the exception of a few articles (conveniently located at the very end of the book), this collection was terrific. I may not get the titles completely right, but my favorites ranged between cheerful & sweet (Lard is Good for You), detailed and entertaining (night in Central Park), delightfully alcoholic (9am drinking in France), investigative and fascinating (politics in tibet), anthropologically rewarding (the area 50 km outside of Moscow), to downright harrowing (The Last Safari). I'm not going to rave about every piece, because some were too wide-ranging and unfocused for me, and several contributors seemed to have acquired an interest in 'protecting the environment,' but little information about what that actually means.

Overall, if you love collected writings (some don't) and travel (which, oddly enough, some don't), you will enjoy this book. I'm already looking forward to next year's.

The title is right: this is some of the best travel writing I have encountered.

It's a collection of short stories, with travel as a common theme. Few are what I'd call tourist guides.

Some of the first few stories stories are about sailboat racing, surviving a night in New York's Central Park, bus riding in Uganda, trucking in tropical Australia, selecting the Panchen Lama, and documentaries about wine and food. There's plenty of variety.

These stories are like good meals: satisfying, pleasant and easy to digest. But they are not lightweight reading. One learns about places and practices that are strange and sometimes disturbing.

It's a book to read in short sessions. I read it at home, in the evenings, but it would be a great to take on a trip.

My wife and I came across this CD in preparation for a very long drive to northern Michigan over the July 4th weekend and I am thoroughly pleased with this most-random selection. Aside from David Halberstam's self-absorbed "Nantucket" which barely passes as travel writing let alone good, let alone fresh (it may have helped if he read this piece) the selections were excellent and varied. Bryson's reading of "Winter Rules" nearly had us off the road southbound on US 127 near Midland, and Adamson's reading of the the thoroughly politically/socially incorrect (and excellent) "Weird Karma" nearly put us into a barrier near Ann Arbor on US 23. Thank you Mr. Bryson et al for that travel moment.

Best yet, the table was so wonderfully set by Bryon himself with his reading of "From the people who brought you the killing fields" by Patrick Symmes. I can only express my appreciation of this selection in the memories it brought back to my days in the 1980s and the wonderfully in-poor-taste song by the Dead Kennedys "A Holiday in Cambodia." Wonderful writing does that to you.

We look forward to reading and hearing the 2001, 2002, and 2003 editions.