Do Travel Writers Go To Hell

For those who think that travel guidebooks are the gospel truth. WANTED: Travel Writer for Brazil QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED Decisiveness: the ability to desert your entire previous life–including well-salaried office job, attractive girlfriend, and basic sanity for less than minimum wage Attention to detail: the skill to research northeastern Brazil, including transportation, restaurants, hotels, culture, customs, and language, while juggling sleep deprivation, nonstop nightlife, and excessive alcohol consumption Creativity: the imagination to write about places you never actually visit Resourcefulness: utilizing persuasion, seduction, and threats, when necessary, to secure a place to stay for the evening once your pitiable advance has been (mis)spent Resilience: determination to overcome setbacks such as bankruptcy, disillusionment, and an ill-fated one-night stand with an Austrian flight attendant As Kohnstamm comes to personal terms with each of these job requirements, he unveils the underside of the travel industry and its often-harrowing effect on writers, travelers, and the destinations themselves. Moreover, he invites us into his world of compromising and scandalous situations in one of the most exciting countries as he races against an impossible deadline.

In the next six weeks you have 1000 miles of Brazil's north-eastern coastline to cover by boat, bus and dune buggy. There are no less than 59 towns, villages and cities on this particular stretch of coastline. You are responsible for 147 hotel reviews, 152 bar and restaurant reviews and details on everything from bus schedules to border crossings. You spent half of your advance on your plane ticket down here and if you find a way to complete the required research in the next six weeks, you will have eight days to write all 112 pages that are due to your editor. Welcome to life as a professional travel writer. Hired in 2004 to contribute to Lonely Planet's Brazil guidebook, Thomas Kohnstamm fled his Thomas Kohnstamm Wall Street job to pursue his dream of being a travel writer. Do Travel Writers Go to Hell? is the story of the adventure that followed. Kohnstamm, a truly unique individual, goes beyond the narrow slice of experiences squeezed into the guidebook format and for the first time offers an unvarnished look at travel writing itself.

Hired in 2004 to contribute to Lonely Planet's Brazil guidebook, Thomas Kohnstamm fled his Wall Street job to pursue his dream of being a travel writer. Do Travel Writers Go to Hell? is the story of the adventure that followed.

Marco Polo Didn’t Go There is a collection of rollicking travel tales from a young writer USA Today has called “Jack Kerouac for the Internet Age.” For the past ten years, Rolf Potts has taken his keen postmodern travel sensibility into the far fringes of five continents for such prestigious publications as National Geographic Traveler, Salon.com, and The New York Times Magazine. This book documents his boldest, funniest, and most revealing journeys—from getting stranded without water in the Libyan desert, to crashing the set of a Leonardo DiCaprio movie in Thailand, to learning the secrets of Tantric sex in a dubious Indian ashram. Marco Polo Didn’t Go There is more than just an entertaining journey into fascinating corners of the world. The book is a unique window into travel writing, with each chapter containing a “commentary track”—endnotes that reveal the ragged edges behind the experience and creation of each tale. Offbeat and insightful, this book is an engrossing read for students of travel writing as well as armchair wanderers.

A tongue-in-cheek travel guide offers mythical, literary, and tourist information

Introduces the history and culture of the nation's provinces and offers advice on accommodations, transportation, languages, restaurants, and interesting places to visit.

Providing information on how to get started in travel journalism, this book deals with all aspects of the profession, from its glamorous image to the gruelling reality.

A finalist for the PEN Center USA Award for Nonfiction Welcome to Paradise, Now Go to Hell, is surfer and former war reporter Chas Smith’s wild and unflinching look at the high-stakes world of surfing on Oahu’s North Shore—a riveting, often humorous, account of beauty, greed, danger, and crime. For two months every winter, when Pacific storms make landfall, swarms of mainlanders, Brazilians, Australians, and Europeans flock to Oahu’s paradisiacal North Shore in pursuit of some of the greatest waves on earth for surfing’s Triple Crown competition. Chas Smith reveals how this influx transforms a sleepy, laid-back strip of coast into a lawless, violent, drug-addled, and adrenaline-soaked mecca. Smith captures this exciting and dangerous place where locals, outsiders, the surf industry, and criminal elements clash in a fascinating look at class, race, power, money, and crime, set within one of the most beautiful places on earth. The result is a breathtaking blend of crime and adventure that captures the allure and wickedness of this idyllic golden world.