The Latest of the Best American Travel Writing series is actually the 2008 version, but I read select stories from the one created in 2005.

My favorite stories are as follows:

--The account of Tim Bascom’s father while stationed in Northern Ethiopia on a mission trip. His father at the time was practicing medicine and as he attempts to heal a patient the patient decides to jump out the window. The reason why is because local customs include a belief that spirits live in human blood and that it should not be transferred from one human to another.

--The story told by Robert Young Pelton as printed in National Geographic Magazine. He was stationed in between Afghanistan and Pakistan during the time when the world was on a hunt for Osama Bin Laden. Hajji, a man Robert often socialized with, admits that Bin Laden may very well be in Chitral Valley.

Other stories told in this analogy represented authors such as these:

Ian Frazier
John McPhee
Pam Houston
Madison Smartt Bell
Seth Stevenson

I found it to be very educational as I was enlightened by these travel accounts. Plenty of culture and history is packed into these pages.

Travel the world. I would love to be a travel writer. That is my ultimate dream right now.

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Created Aug 26, 2009 at 12:10am • Submit your own review...