Today, they lead to Beijing.'When The Silk Roads was published in 2015, it became an instant classic. A major reassessment of world history, it compelled us to look at the past from a different perspective. The New Silk Roads brings this story up to date, addressing the present and future of a world that is changing dramatically.Following the Silk Roads eastwards, from Europe through to China, by way of Russia and the Middle East, The New Silk Roads provides a timely reminder that we live in a world that is profoundly interconnected. In an age of Brexit and Trump, the themes of isolation and fragmentation permeating the Western world stand in sharp contrast to events along the Silk Roads since 2015, where ties have been strengthened and mutual cooperation established.With brilliant insight, Peter Frankopan takes a fresh look at the network of relationships being formed along the length and breadth of the Silk Roads today, assessing the global reverberations of these continual shifts in the centre of power - all too often absent from headlines in the West. This important - and ultimately hopeful - book asks us to reassess who we are and where we are in the world, illuminating the themes on which all our lives and livelihood depend.

    She had the world to choose from: she chose Afghanistan. She went to witness the final humiliation of a superpower in terminal decline as the Soviet Union was defeated by the mujahedeen. What she didn't know then was that Afghanistan would remain her focus for the next eighteen years. Gannon, uniquely among Western journalists, witnessed Afghanistan's tragic opera: the final collapse of communism followed by bitterly feuding warlords being driven from power by an Islamicist organization called the Taliban; the subsequent arrival of Arabs and exiles, among them Osama bin Laden; and the transformation of the country into the staging post for a global jihad. Gannon observed something else as well: the terrible, unforeseen consequences of Western intervention, the ongoing suffering of ordinary Afghans, and the ability of the most corrupt and depraved of the warlords to reinvent and reinsert themselves into successive governments. I is for Infidel is the story of a country told by a writer with a uniquely intimate knowledge of its people and recent history. It will transform readers' understanding of Afghanistan, and inspire awe at the resilience of its people in the face of the monstrous warmongers we have to some extent created there.

    His experiences, as he has collected them together in Hell West and Crooked, will surely become an Australian classic.

    As a young student in London, he embarked on a quest to grasp the meaning and contemporary relevance of his religion and, hopefully, to find “paradise.” After experimenting with the mystical branch of Islam, Sufism, and with classical Islam, he set off on extensive travels through the Muslim world. Along the way, he came to accept that he might never reach paradise, realizing that it’s the journey that’s important. At a time when the Western view of Islam is so often distorted and over-simplified, Desperately Seeking Paradise is essential reading.

    The destination: Jerusalem, city of gold. For more than eight years, Severin followed the historic trail, riding through northern Europe's green countryside and into the heat of the Near East. In the process, he covered more than 2,500 miles by horse, past ruined Crusader settlements and ancient battlefields, over arduous mountain passes, and across Anatolian steppes. A dazzling synthesis of adventure, practical history, and exploration, told by one of our finest and most respected travel writers--illustrated with his own photographs.

    Once again there are comical and insightful tales of life in wild and stunning locations.Readers will be further enlightened by the escapades of the unforgettable farmer Foteini: her unique take on life; her outrageous ‘fashions’, including a makeshift shoe design you will never forget, and her ‘haute couture’ offerings for Riko the donkey.As well as tales of the Peloponnese, there are stories from other Greek locations the couple have visited, including Pelion and the islands of Santorini and Corfu. This book also offers a fascinating glimpse into some of the author’s earliest trips to Greece with tales that have not been published before, including a year of teaching English in Athens during a dangerous time of political upheaval; a humorous story of facing up to bizarre religious relics in Corfu; and a long sabbatical in Crete that didn’t quite go to plan, with a hint of unexpected romance in an idyllic setting.This book also includes some of the author's photographs of her travels in Greece.

    In a fit of rebellion, he quits his job to bicycle the Karakoram Highway in northern Pakistan. He is twenty-two and absolutely clueless. Miraculously, hilariously, he survives — and discovers his life’s passion.Over the next fifteen years, Kirkby navigates an evermore uncertain and uncommon path, honing his skills on some of the most challenging expeditions the world has to offer. Whether it’s gun fights and crocodile attacks while running Africa’s Blue Nile Gorge, the rescue of a fallen sherpa on Mount Everest, evading capture in Myanmar’s forbidden tropical paradise, or learning to embrace the wilderness on the Tatshenshini River of Canada’s Arctic, Kirkby shares with the reader the excitement, doubts, insights, and even the uncomfortable self-knowledge that a life lived on the edge brings.

    This updated edition of Birnbaum's Walt Disney World Resort takes readers through Disney's biggest resort with ease and flair and includes the most accurate, current information on prices and attractions. What's new in 2016:• The brand-new Frozen attraction, scheduled to burst onto the Epcot scene in 2016,whisks guests on a chilly trip to meet Anna, Elsa, and Olaf. • Our coverage of Disney's Hollywood Studios includes the inside scoop on plans for new Star Wars-themed additions and other shows and attractions.• Experience new shows and attractions, including the Magic Kingdom's popular new parades:Festival of Fantasy and Move It! Shake it! Dance and Play It!• Fastpass+is Walt Disney World's advance reservation system for theme park shows and attractions. We offer tips and strategies for making the most of this free service.• Downtown Disney has morphed into Disney Springs, a bustling waterside enclave teeming with new dining, shopping, and recreational activities. • Our newly-expanded dining chapter details each and every restaurant, and includes menu updates, a "best of wow restaurant roundup", and specialized indexes.• The 2016 Guide has more photos than ever, including brand-new photo hunts for each of the World's four theme parks. Can you find them all?• Baffled by WDW's magic band? Don't be! We give the scoop on maximizing the potential of the band.• A wave of new entertainment has hit World Showcase: we'll tell you where to see new acts featuring lumberjacks, Celtic folk musicians, and flag wavers.• Disney's Polynesian Village resort has been renewed and revitalized, thanks Disney Vacation Club. • Checkout our bonus chapter featuring "Land and Sea vacation" planning advice, perfect for pairing a Disney Cruise with a visit to Walt Disney World.

    

    But our story largely omits a whole civilization whose citizens shared an entirely different narrative for a thousand years.In Destiny Disrupted, Tamim Ansary tells the rich story of world history as the Islamic world saw it, from the time of Mohammed to the fall of the Ottoman Empire and beyond. He clarifies why our civilizations grew up oblivious to each other, what happened when they intersected, and how the Islamic world was affected by its slow recognition that Europe-a place it long perceived as primitive and disorganized-had somehow hijacked destiny.

    But that was nothing compared to the next assignment: saving a slum school in the Indian city of Poona. Learning as much as he is teaching, Will finds his life transformed by his remarkable class of orphans: Dulabesh, the head-standing joker who lost his parents on a crowded railway platform; Prakash, who learned self-sufficiency by scavenging in dumpsters; the charmingly madcap Tanushri, fan of the singer "Maradona." When the slumlords threaten to level the school, Will hits upon the idea of a fund-raiser to save it: a stage production of the 24,000-verse Indian epic, The Ramayana, ever so slightly condensed…By turns funny and poignant, this is a gloriously life-affirming account of the India tourists never see.

    It tells the human story, and illuminates the global political workings. It is a tale of evasion, collusion, betrayal and the deep pain of isolation. Staying with a small group of characters throughout, The Exile moves through a series of dramatic set-pieces, from the shocking failure of the Battle of Tora Bora, one of the most significant losses in US strategic history, when, outgunned and outflanked, Osama still managed to give the world's most accomplished trackers the slip, through his covert journey from safe-house to safe-house in Pakistan, to the years spent hiding in the military compound in Abottabad where he was eventually to be killed. Using the contacts built up through years of research, including wives of key players such as Osama bin Laden and his mastermind, Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, the authors have gained extraordinary and intimate insight into Osama bin Laden and those closest to him. Meticulously researched, beautifully written, this is an enthralling and revelatory journey.

    Stern, domineering, fiercely loving, Lotty Kneen—born Dragitsa—was always tight-lipped about her early life and family history. She rebuffed Krissy’s curiosity and forbade her from taking the trip back to the old country that might have satisfied it.When her grandmother died recently, Krissy finally felt at liberty to explore the questions that had nagged at her for so long. In The Three Burials of Lotty Kneen Krissy sets out with a box containing her grandmother’s ashes, intending to trace the old woman’s early life in Slovenia and Egypt, and perhaps locate some remnants of family. Along the way she uncovers the extraordinary story of the colony of Slovene women who became the nannies of choice for the wealthy Italians of pre-war Alexandria—and identifies as best she can the places where Lotty’s restless, demanding spirit will be at peace.

    But not fearless adventurer Ben Kozel, author of the bestselling Three Men in a Raft. When he returned home after risking life an limb in South America, the question uppermost in his mind was 'where to next?' Ben found the answer in the Yenisey River, which, while it is the fifth longest on the planet, remains one of the world's least-known waterways. So with three companions, Ben embarked on a five month, 5540-kilometre odyssey.They would cross the Mongolian Steppe, traverse the vast boreal forests of Siberia, and enter the realm of tundra high above the Arctic Circle, rowing a leaking and formerly-derelict wooden dory, painstakingly rebuilt by them on a shoe-string budget. Risking rivers in flood, the treacherous and mysterious Lake Baikal, deadly tick-born diseases, Siberian mobsters, radioactive contamination and the onset of the Arctic winter, Ben proved once and for all that he is one of Australia's most gifted and intrepid travel writers - or, as his friends prefer to call him, ;a very lucky bastard'.Filled with hair raising exploits and vivid description, Five Months in a Leaky Boat is both a riveting adventure story, and an intimate look at the beauty and complexity of an almost unknown part of the world.

    (Spoiler: That lasts two days.)Then it’s buttock-bruising buses and chock-a-block trains for a farcical journey around the country, across the Punjab and Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, through Maharashtra and Karnataka and Tamil Nadu; to super-cities like Delhi and Mumbai and Kolkata, and sacred spots like Amritsar and Varanasi and Rishikesh, and lesser-visited locations like Madurai and Madikeri and McLeod Ganj.Along the way, Mark sees the awful and the absurd and the awesome, encounters the horrors and riches of India, a country of extreme contrasts that he struggles to survive, strives to like. He has to laugh — it was either that or cry.He meets randy perverts and mystical madmen, sees bodies barbecued beside the Ganges, goes insane when he drinks bhang lassi, wears skinny jeans to a yoga class, and visits the cult of “The Mother”.For a country like no other, it’s a travel book like no other.(*Note*: If you like yoga or knitting or The Guardian, or are the sort of person that orders a korma, this book isn't for you — you'll hate it.)