Perseus Academic: Marco Polo Didn't Go There by Rolf Potts

Potts is one of the best travel writers to emerge in the last decade.

Intrepid and thoughtful, he's a Paul Theroux for the backpacker

generation, and Marco Polo reflects this.

— San Francisco Chronicle

This hilarious collection of stories provokes because Potts asks the

serious question of how to travel in a discovered world. …If you aspire

to be a travel writer, read this book.

— The Guardian (U.K.)

Potts isn't so much a travel reporter as a story teller. …He's more

about getting under the skin of a place — detailing a cast of characters

that would either enthrall or scare the hell out of most travelers,

depending on where they come down on the trust-paranoia continuum.

— Orange County Register

An equal mix of humor and enlightenment…Potts shows travelers and

would-be travelers the joy of immersing oneself in a foreign culture.

— St. Louis Post-Dispatch Best Books of 2008

Potts, Internet raconteur and travel-advice sage, is the kind of guy you

wish the pubs had more of: well traveled, generous with funny stories,

eager to listen to yours. You feel envious that you weren't with him in

Cairo to share the convivial squalor of a backpacker hotel, or at an

Indian ashram to study Tantric sex, or even in the Libyan Desert, in the

dark, out of water and lost. And he's able to draw insights from all that

without draining the fun out of the conversation — difficult to carry off

in a pub or a book.

— The Washington Post

Armchair travelers will get an enormous kick out of this thoroughly

entertaining book.

— Booklist