The Vanished Kingdom - Travels Through The History Of Prussia by James Charles Roy

$16.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

Twice in this century, Germany initiated wars of unimagined terror and destruction. In both cases, defense of the “Prussian” realm, the German homeland, was the perceived and vilified perpetrator. Few today understand with any precision what “Prussia” means, either geographically or nationalistically, b ut neither would they deny the psychic resonance of the single word. To most, it means unbridled aggression, the image of the goose-stepping Junker.But what was once Prussia is now a significant portion of Eastern Europe, a contested homeland first won by Christian knights of the Teutonic Order. For centuries thereafter its terrain has been crisscrossed by war and partitioned by barbed wire. In its final catastrophe of 1945, nearly two million German refugees fled the region as Russian armies broke the eastern front, perhaps the greatest dislocation of a civilian population at any time during World War II. With the Berlin Wall now a memory and the Soviet Union in a state of collapse, this remains a geography in shambles. Modern travelers can now, for the first time in decades, see and ponder for themselves what Prussia really was and now is.James Charles Roy and Amos Elon, two writers noted for their inquisitive natures, have gone to search through the rubble themselves. They intermingle present-day observations with moving vignettes from the German and Prussian past, sketching a portrait of the Europe we know today. The story is spiced with interviews and reminiscences, unforgettable in their sadness, of people looking back at a life now gone, a life full of turmoil and heartache, memories both fond and tragic. The final result: a far deeper understanding of the tattered lands of today's Eastern Europe. ...Show more

When in Rome: 2000 Years of Roman Sightseeing by Matthew Sturgis

$16.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

The story of what Rome's visitors have looked at over the past two thousand years: the buildings, the statues, the paintings, the artefacts that have most impressed each generation of travellers from the time of the Roman Republic in the second century BC up to the present age of mass tourism.

A Dream in Polar Fog by Yuri Rytkheu

$18.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

"Rarely has humanity's relationship to nature been so beautifully and vividly depicted. A Dream in Polar Fog is both elegant and exciting and also serves as a living anthropology of a gone world. It accomplishes everything a novel should."Neal Pollack A Dream in Polar Fog is at once a cross-cultural journey, an ethnographic chronicle of the Chukchi people, and a politically and emotionally charged Arctic adventure story. ...Show more

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt

$12.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

Presents a true story of intrigue, murder, forgery and eccentricity set in the steamy, surreal atmosphere of Savannah, Georgia. This book brings the unpredictable twists and turns of a murder case that are interwoven with a first-person account of life in this isolated remnant of the Old South.

Lights Out for the Territory - 9 Excursions in the Secret History of London by Ian Sinclair; Marc Atkins (Illustrator)

$15.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

This is a record of long journeys on foot, from Hackney to Chingford and down to the river, around the City in its ring of steel, and through the heart of Westminster, Lambeth and Millbank.

North Korea Journal by Michael Palin

$14.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: near fine

A glimpse of life inside the world's most secretive country, as told by Britain's best-loved travel writer. In May 2018, former Monty Python stalwart and intrepid globetrotter Michael Palin spent two weeks in the notoriously secretive Democratic People's Republic of Korea, a cut-off land without interne t or phone signal, where the countryside has barely moved beyond a centuries-old peasant economy but where the cities have gleaming skyscrapers and luxurious underground train stations. His resulting documentary for Channel 5 was widely acclaimed. Now he shares his day-by-day diary of his visit, in which he describes not only what he saw - and his fleeting views of what the authorities didn't want him to see - but recounts the conversations he had with the country's inhabitants, talks candidly about his encounters with officialdom, and records his musings about a land wholly unlike any other he has ever visited - one that inspires fascination and fear in equal measure. Written with Palin's trademark warmth and wit, and illustrated with beautiful colour photographs throughout, the journal offers a rare insight into the North Korea behind the headlines. ...Show more

Night Haunts - A journey through the London night by Sukhdev Sandhu

$12.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

London at night, from Shakespeare's time to Dickens to Jack the Ripper, was always seen as a lawless orgy of depravity and pestilence, teeming with rogues and bandits. But is it now as bland and unthreatening as any new town? Sukhdev Sandhu journeys across London to find out whether the London night rea lly has been rendered neutral by street lighting and CCTV cameras. Sandhu's forays see him prospecting in the London night with the people who drive its pulse, from the avian police to security guards, zookeepers and exorcists. He wades through the sewers, hangs out with pirate DJs and accompanies the marine patrol looking for midnight corpses. In a beautifully written and wonderfully illustrated book he seeks to reclaim the mystery and romance of the city - to revitalise the great myth of London for a new century. ...Show more

The Danakil Diary - Journeys Through Abyssinia 1930-34 by Wilfred Thesiger

$12.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: good

The earliest and most influential expeditions of the man now considered to be the greatest living explorer. The Danakil Diary is the account of two journeys Thesiger made into the Danakil country in Abyssinia, now Ethiopia, in 1930-34 at the age of 24 - which, today, he still regards as the most dangero us he undertook. It was an extraordinary journey and a remarkable achievement. Thesiger succeeded in penetrating country that had wiped out two Italian expeditions and an Egyptian army before him, discovered what happened to the Awash River (one of the area's last geographical mysteries to be solved) and managed to survive amongst the Danakil tribesmen, to whom a man's status depended on the number of men he had killed and castrated. Besides giving early proof of Thesiger's descriptive genius - with his portrayal of the beautiful, savage landscapes, and their varied wildlife - The Danakil Diary reveals youthful evidence of his fierce motivation and uncompromising will, which are familiar hallmarks of his sixty years of travel among primitive peoples in some of the harshest and remotest areas of the world. ...Show more

A Voyage in the Sunbeam - Our Home on the Ocean for Eleven Months by Anna Brassey

$16.00 NZD

Category: Nautical | Reading Level: very good

Mexican Days - Journeys into the heart of Mexico by Tony Cohan

$10.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

Tony Cohan's indelible vision of a seductive, enticing and intoxicating world in ON MEXICAN TIME, his bestselling chronicle of discovering a new life in the tiny mountain town of San Miguel de Allende, become a travel classic. In MEXICAN DAYS point of arrival becomes point of departure as - faced with t he invasion of the town by tourists and an entire Hollywood movie crew, a magazine editor's irresistible invitation and his own incurable wanderlust - he undertakes a much deeper exploration of his adopted country. Set against the backdrop of a changing world, he explores a Mexico both old and new: among the misty mountains and coastal Caribbean towns of Veracruz; the ruins and resorts of Yucat n; the stirring indigenous world of Chiapas; the colourful markets of Oaxaca; the teeming labyrinth of Mexico City; the surrealist gardens at Xilitla in the remote Sierra Gorda mountains; the haunted city of Guanajuato; and the evocative Mayan ruins of Palenque. Along the way he encounters expatriates and artists, shady operatives, surrealists and figures from his past. A celebration of the joys and revelations to be found in this seductive and mysterious land, MEXICAN DAYS is an intimate exploration of the heart of ancient and contemporary Mexico by a writer at the height of his powers. First published 2006. ...Show more

Voyages and Visions - Towards a Cultural History of Travel by Jas Elsner (Editor); Joan-Pau Rubiés (Editor)

$20.00 NZD

Category: History | Series: Critical Views Ser. | Reading Level: very good

A much-needed contribution to the expanding interest in the history of travel and travel writing, Voyages and Visions is the first attempt to sketch a cultural history of travel from the sixteenth century to the present day. The essays address the theme of travel as a historical, literary and imaginativ e process, focusing on significant episodes and encounters in world history. The contributors to this collection include historians of art and of science, anthropologists, literary critics and mainstream cultural historians. Their essays encompass a challenging range of subjects, including the explorations of South America, India and Mexico; mountaineering in the Himalayas; space travel; science fiction; and American post-war travel fiction. Voyages and Visions is truly interdisciplinary, and essential reading for anyone interested in travel writing. With essays by Kasia Boddy, Michael Bravo, Peter Burke, Melissa Calaresu, Jesus Maria Carillo Castillo, Peter Hansen, Edward James, Nigel Leask, Joan-Pau Rubies and Wes Williams. ...Show more

The Island of Sakhalin by Anton Chekhov

$30.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good