Six great beach reads for travelers

by Katie Hammel on

There’s a special joy that comes with losing yourself in a good book while relaxing on a beach. The warm sun on your skin, the sand between your toes, and the sound of waves gently breaking on the shore create the perfect environment for shrugging off your cares and transporting yourself to a new world. Here are a few of my favorite travel books – perfect picks for an easy summer read no matter what your style.


If you’re looking for a trashy novel. . .
Summer beach reading should be light, fun, and maybe a little tawdry. Thomas Kohnstamm’s Do Travel Writers Go to Hell? fits the bill perfectly. The subtitle, A Swashbuckling Tale of High Adventures, Questionable Ethics and Professional Hedonism, describes the plot quite well. The book tells the story of Kohnstamm’s first guidebook-writing assignment for Lonely Planet. He gives up his apartment, job, and girlfriend to travel to and write about northern Brazil and soon realizes he’s in far over his head. What follows is a hilarious and controversial account of his adventures, how he learns the ropes of guidebook writing, and just how guidebooks are created.

If you’re looking for a travel-writing how-to. . .
Rolf Potts’ Marco Polo Didn’t Go There: Stories and Recollections from One Decade as a Post-Modern Travel Writer is perfect for the aspiring travel writer, or anyone interested in a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into a travel story. The book includes some of Potts’ published work (well-written, insightful, and entertaining stories on their own), followed by interesting end notes about how each story came about, from what really happened and what didn’t make it into the final copy to the long road from experience to published article.

If you’re looking for an inspiring story. . .
If you dream of one day taking charge of your life and pursuing your passions, Unlikely Destinations: The Lonely Planet Story is for you. The story traces the creation of the Lonely Planet empire, from Tony and Maureen Wheeler’s decision to take an overland journey from Europe to Australia to the publishing of their first guidebook and the subsequent failures and triumphs of the company. Even if your goals don’t involve building one of the top travel book publishing companies in the world, the story of chasing your dreams and finding success will inspire you.

If you’re looking for a good laugh. . .
Bill Bryson’s I’m a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years Away is a quick beach read that will keep you laughing all afternoon. Based on the hilarious writer’s newspaper column, the short stories point out the idiosyncrasies and oddities of life in America. From dealing with the Post Office to the difficulties of preparing a tax return, the book perfectly captures small town life in America and pokes fun at some of the country’s stranger traditions. The chapters are all quite short, perfect if you’ve got kids to mind and can’t commit to lengthier reading periods.

If you’re looking for a collection of short stories. . .
The Best American Travel Writing series has been combining great travel stories and narratives from websites, magazines, and newspapers, and putting them in one place for nearly a decade. The 2008 edition was edited by Anthony Bourdain and covers everything from restaurants in Kabul to weddings in St. Petersburg. With a dozen or so unique tales from different voices in each book, the collection will satisfy your need for short story variety and entertain you with engrossing travel narratives.

If you’re looking for intellectual stimulation. . .
If you’re the type who loves reading about research and studies, Eric Weiner’s The Geography of Bliss: One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places in the World is right up your alley. Weiner set off to explore what makes us happy, and how economic conditions, culture, and traditions in various countries make people happy (or not). Along the way he visits countries like Iceland, India, Bhutan, Moldova and Thailand to see just how happy or unhappy the people are, and why. Along with being a fascinating and educational read, it also happens to be pretty darn funny too.

GADLING TAKE 5: Week of 4-18-2008

by Catherine Bodry on

I suppose this week will go down in travel-writing history as the week of the TKA. In case you’ve been at the South Pole all week, that would be the Thomas Kohnstamm affair. The whole fiasco prompted all stages of grief in the travel-writing world: shock, denial, anger, despair, and, finally, acceptance — sort of. Aaron, Jeffrey and Justin covered the scandal, and if you’d like a play-by-play, read the following posts:

Other stuff happened this week, too. Here are a few examples:

Hope you have a scandal-free weekend.

Does Thomas Kohnstamm deserve an apology?

by Aaron Hotfelder on

In an interview posted late yesterday at World Hum, Lonely Planet author Thomas Kohnstamm explains how he’s unwittingly found himself at the center of an unexpected controversy.

The author, who was quoted by dozens of newspapers over the weekend admitting to all kinds of guidebook-writing malfeasance, says that the situation has been “blown way out of proportion.” In fact, Kohnstamm claims, he wasn’t guilty of anything besides accepting a few comps and doing a bit of hotel and restaurant research on the internet instead of in person.

Several days ago, before the World Hum interview, I wrote an oft-cited post calling Kohnstamm a fraud and expressing outrage at his behavior. Now that Kohnstamm has backtracked from his previous statements, does he deserve an apology?

Well, yes and no. Kohnstamm certainly was not guilty of all the charges leveled at him, and some of the criticism he received was unfair. He doesn’t appear to be a massive plagiarizer of the Jayson Blair ilk, and I’d wager he’s far from the devil he’s been made out to be, here and elsewhere. Also, it probably would have been prudent for me to contact him before writing the “fraud” post to see if he was quoted correctly, even though he doesn’t dispute that he was.

With all that said, it’s hard to muster much sympathy for Kohnstamm, since he was the one responsible for bringing up these charges in the first place. He repeatedly gave his interviewer the impression that he was a veritable “bad boy” of travel writing, saying, for example, of his agreement with Lonely Planet regarding the Colombia guidebook:

“They didn’t pay me enough to go (to) Colombia. I wrote the book in San Francisco. I got the information from a chick I was dating-an intern in the Colombian Consulate.”

Clearly, Kohnstamm’s implication is that he was supposed to visit Colombia, but the misers at Lonely Planet were too cheap to make it worthwhile. Turns out, as Justin reported yesterday, Kohnstamm and LP agreed that he wouldn’t visit Colombia, as he was responsible only for writing the history, environment, food and drink, and culture sections of the book. So why make that explicit to the interviewer? Easy: because that’s not interesting, and it doesn’t move books.

Now, Kohnstamm is calling his Colombia claim “regrettable” and “an unfortunate choice of words.” Hard to argue with that.

His situation now is a bit like that of the college guy on Spring Break who lies to his buddies, telling them that he cheated on his girlfriend with a gorgeous, blonde 19-year-old. When the news eventually makes it back to the girlfriend– as it always does– he’s in the unenviable position of having to explain that before he was lying, but now he’s telling the truth.

As for the claim that he accepted “comps” from hotels and restaurants, he says that’s true, but he tried to avoid doing it as much as possible. Frankly, I can’t work up much outrage over this, and I’d never condemn a guidebook author for taking a discount here and there– as long as they aren’t in exchange for positive reviews. Kohnstamm is right that these guys don’t get paid much, and hell, I’d probably take a discount or two myself. (Gadling credentials, anyone?)

All this doesn’t leave me feeling as if I have much to apologize for, I must say. Look back at my original post, and I’ll stand by what I wrote: Self-promotion? Entitlement? Decreasing the reputation of LP and its hard-working writers? As Elvis used to say, I’ll take all of the above with a side order of more.

But wait, does Kohnstamm even want an apology? Probably not. He just wants everybody to forget about this. But oh yeah, remember to buy his book.