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Thailand (Country Guide)
Discover ThailandUncover Bangkok's best street stalls or enjoy a skyscraping gourmet dinner. Climb aboard a long-tail boat and island hop to your own isolated beach paradise Get soaked at Songkran, the Thai celebration that becomes the world's biggest water fight. Trek off the beaten path in remote Isan to watch a rare solar alignment at an ancient Angkor temple. In This GuideTen authors, 259 days of in-country research and 150 maps. Trek, dive or monkey-watch with our detailed coverage of national parks and natural wonders. Visit lonelyplanet.com for up-to-the-minute reviews, updates and traveler suggestions..
Price: $16.37
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The Eaves of Heaven: A Life in Three Wars
From Andrew X. Pham, the award-winning author of Catfish and Mandala, a son’s searing memoir of his Vietnamese father’s experiences over the course of three wars. The Philadelphia Inquirer hailed Andrew Pham’s debut, Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam, for evoking “the full sadness of the human condition . . . marveling at spiritual resilience amid irreconcilable facts.” The New York Times Book Review called it, simply, “remarkable.” Now, in The Eaves of Heaven, Pham gives voice to his father’s unique experience in an unforgettable story of war and remembrance. Once wealthy landowners, Thong Van Pham’s family was shattered by the tumultuous events of the twentieth century: the festering French occupation of Indochina, the Japanese invasion during World War II, and the Vietnam War. Told in dazzling chapters that alternate between events in the past and those closer to the present, The Eaves of Heaven brilliantly re-creates the trials of everyday life in Vietnam as endured by one man, from the fall of Hanoi and the collapse of French colonialism to the frenzied evacuation of Saigon. Pham offers a rare portal into a lost world as he chronicles Thong Van Pham’s heartbreaks, triumphs, and bizarre reversals of fortune, whether as a South Vietnamese soldier pinned down by enemy fire, a prisoner of the North Vietnamese under brutal interrogation, or a refugee desperately trying to escape Vietnam after the last American helicopter has abandoned Saigon. This is the story of a man caught in the maelstrom of twentieth-century politics, a gripping memoir told with the urgency of a wartime dispatch by a writer of surpassing talent..
Price: $14.18
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Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam
Invariably, armies are accused of preparing to fight the previous war. In Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife, Lieutenant Colonel John A. Nagl—a veteran of both Operation Desert Storm and the current conflict in Iraq—considers the now-crucial question of how armies adapt to changing circumstances during the course of conflicts for which they are initially unprepared. Through the use of archival sources and interviews with participants in both engagements, Nagl compares the development of counterinsurgency doctrine and practice in the Malayan Emergency from 1948 to 1960 with what developed in the Vietnam War from 1950 to 1975. In examining these two events, Nagl—the subject of a recent New York Times Magazine cover story by Peter Maass—argues that organizational culture is key to the ability to learn from unanticipated conditions, a variable which explains why the British army successfully conducted counterinsurgency in Malaya but why the American army failed to do so in Vietnam, treating the war instead as a conventional conflict. Nagl concludes that the British army, because of its role as a colonial police force and the organizational characteristics created by its history and national culture, was better able to quickly learn and apply the lessons of counterinsurgency during the course of the Malayan Emergency. With a new preface reflecting on the author's combat experience in Iraq, Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife is a timely examination of the lessons of previous counterinsurgency campaigns that will be hailed by both military leaders and interested civilians. (01/15/2006).
Price: $10.70
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First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers (P.S.)
Written in the present tense, First They Killed My Father will put you right in the midst of the action--action you'll wish had never happened It's a tough read, but definitely a worthwhile one, and the author's personality and strength shine through on every page. Covering the years from 1975 to 1979, the story moves from the deaths of multiple family members to the forced separation of the survivors, leading ultimately to the reuniting of much of the family, followed by marriages and immigrations. The brutality seems unending--beatings, starvation, attempted rape, mental cruelty--and yet the narrator (a young girl) never stops fighting for escape and survival. Sad and courageous, her life and the lives of her young siblings provide quite a powerful example of how war can so deeply affect children--especially a war in which they are trained to be an integral part of the armed forces. For anyone interested in Cambodia's recent history, this book shares a valuable personal view of events. --Jill Lightner.
Price: $6.98
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Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam
A great memoirist can burnish even an ordinary childhood into something bright--see, for instance, Annie Dillard's An American Childhood. So what about a really good writer with access to a dramatic and little-documented story? This is the case with Catfish and Mandala, Vietnamese American Andrew X. Pham's captivating first book, which delves fearlessly into questions of home, family, and identity. The son of Vietnamese parents who suffered terribly during the Vietnam War and brought their family to America when he was 10, Pham, on the cusp of his 30s, defied his parents' conservative hopes for him and his engineering career by becoming a poorly paid freelance writer. After the suicide of his sister, he set off on an even riskier path to travel some of the world on his bicycle. In the grueling, enlightening year that followed, he pedaled through Mexico, the American West Coast, Japan, and finally his far-off first land, Vietnam. The story, with some of a mandala's repeated symbolic motifs, works on several levels at once. It is an exploration into the meaning of home, a descriptive travelogue, and an intimate look at the Vietnamese immigrant experience. There are beautifully illuminated flashbacks to the experience of fleeing Vietnam and to an earlier, more innocent childhood. While Pham's stern father, a survivor of Vietcong death camps, regrets that Pham has not been a respectful Vietnamese son, he also reveals that he wishes he himself had been more "American" for his kids, that he had "taken [them] camping." Catfish and Mandala is a book of double-edged truths, and it would make a fascinating study even in less able hands. In those of the adventurous, unsentimental Pham, it is an irresistible story. --Maria Dolan.
Price: $5.75
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Dispatches
Michael Herr, who wrote about the Vietnam War for Esquire magazine, gathered his years of notes from his front-line reporting and turned them into what many people consider the best account of the war to date, when published in 1977. He captured the feel of the war and how it differed from any theater of combat ever fought, as well as the flavor of the time and the essence of the people who were there. Since Dispatches was published, other excellent books have appeared on the war--may we suggest The Things They Carried, The Sorrow of War, We Were Soldiers Once ... and Young--but Herr's book was the first to hit the target head-on and remains a classic..
Price: $6.35
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Southeast Asia: On a Shoestring
Trek deep into the jungles of Borneo or laze on stunning Bali beaches. Eat your way through Singapore or dance all night in buzzing Bangkok clubs. Discover ancient Angkor temples or go grass roots and volunteer in Hanoi. Whatever you seek, Lonely Planet's yellow bible has it covered. With more than 33 years of experience, and a team of backpacking authors, our guide helps you dig deeper, stay longer, and spend less. Get ready - your Southeast Asian adventure starts here. Get The Lowdown on the environment, history, culture and current events in our Snapshots chapter Eat Cheap and Sleep Easy with our fully updated coverage of the best street stalls, budget digs and places to party Blaze Your Own Trail using our full-color regional map and detailed local maps Talk The Talk with help from our Language chapter .
Price: $15.99
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Turkey (Eyewitness Travel Guides)
From Greek and Roman ruins such as Ephesus to busting bazaars to virgin beaches, this guide brings the reader the best that Turkey has to offer. Includes extensive coverage of the different quarters of Istanbul and highlights places such as Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque..
Price: $11.21
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Bali & Lombok (Lonely Planet Travel Guide)
Discover Bali & LombokScramble down rocky cliffs to find a private surf beach, then climb back up to your motorbike, tanned and supercharged. Flip yourself over the edge of a boat while diving the blue depths off the Gili Islands in Lombok. Dance the day's sand off your feet at Kuta's rowdy clubs or spruce up for Seminyak's sleek bars and restaurants. Sip honey-ginger tea in a rose-petal bath, drifting back to earth after a mandi lulur massage. In This Guide:Two great authors, 68 days of in-country research, 51 detailed maps, 133 bottles of Bintang. An all new outdoor activities section with detailed diving and surfing information. Features a Food & Drink chapter by renowned Ubud restaurateur and author Janet de Neefe..
Price: $13.69
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Vietnam (Country Guide)
Discover VietnamLie back on your very own junk and enjoy the languid beauty of Halong Bay's limestone outcrops. Get lost in Hanoi's Old Quarter; sup on streetside pho and toast your fellow diners with a bia hoi. Squeeze into the Cu Chi Tunnels and marvel at the engineering ingenuity that kept the VC hidden from enemy fire. Join the locals in an afternoon pick-me-up of snake's heart and a cup of serpent blood. In This GuideThree authors, 133 days of in-country research and 105 maps - more than any other guide. Content updated daily - visit lonelyplanet.com for up-to-the-minute reviews, updates and traveler suggestions. .
Price: $13.68
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