| by Eric Hansen
(Methuen £14.99, ISBN 0413774988)
Subtitled 'Close encounters with strangers', Hansen paints superb word portraits of people and places in this quirky and readable collection of stories.
His experiences span drinking mind-altering kava in Vanuatu, surviving Cyclone Tracy on a fishing boat off the Australian coast, the heart-rending time spent helping at Mother Theresa's sanctuary in Calcutta, and searching for a wedding ring after a fatal air crash in Borneo.
Then there are memorable meetings with extraordinary people, like Madame Zola, the elderly Russian lady who prepares magnificent food in her tiny kitchen in rundown New York, surrounded by drug dealers and murderers. And the man researching the sex lives of banana slugs, who takes lap dancers on bird-watching trips (but don't tell his mother). |
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