Frank Carlson Library

The acclaimed author recounts his epic journey across Europe and Asia in this international bestselling classic of travel literature: “Compulsive reading” (Graham Greene).
 
In 1973, Paul Theroux embarked on a four-month journey by train from the United Kingdom through Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. In The Great Railway Bazaar, he records in vivid detail and penetrating insight the many fascinating...

"Simple text and full-color photography introduce beginning readers to Asia. Developed by literacy experts for students in kindergarten through third grade"--

In 1271 Marco Polo set out on a journey to China to meet the Mongol Emperor Kublaï Khan. He returned with stories that would take a lifetime to tell. Featuring exotic creatures, strange customs, extraordinary legends, and political intrigues, The Travels of Marco Polo reveals the fantastical treasures of the East in the words of the legendary medieval explorer. Conjuring up a forgotten world filled with mystery where wonder lurks around every...

His pilgrimage through the East began in 1271 when, still a teenager, he found himself traversing the most exotic lands-from the dazzling Mongol empire to Tibet and Burma. This fascinating chronicle still serves as the most vivid depiction of the mysterious East in the Middle Ages. This brilliant volume vividly brings to life the mysterious East in the Middle Ages by chronicling the author's journey from Venice to Asia, during which he met people...

Retells the folktale of the gecko who complains to the village chief that the fireflies keep him awake at night but then learns that in nature all things are connected.

"There never was anybody," wrote the Spectator, "who had adventures as well as Miss Bird." In Among the Tibetans you can see why, as Isabella Lucy Bird writes of her journey through the Himalayas on horseback and of her four months of living with "the pleasantest of people." She offers evocative and colourful descriptions of Tibetan rituals and culture, along with vivid descriptions of its villages, monasteries, temples and palaces.

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From ancient Malay settlements to Spanish colonization, the American occupation and beyond, A History of the Philippines recasts various Philippine narratives with an eye for the layers of colonial and post-colonial history that have created this diverse and fascinating population. A History of the Philippines begins with the pre-Westernized Philippines in the 16th century and continues through the 1899 Philippine-American War, the nation's relationship...

Sultans, Spices, and Tsunamis: The Incredible Story of the World's Largest ArchipelagoIndonesia is by far the largest nation in Southeast Asia and has the fourth largest population in the world after the United States. Indonesian history and culture are especially relevant today as the Island nation is an emerging power in the region with a dynamic new leader. It is a land of incredible diversity and unending paradoxes that has a long and rich history...

"Simple text and photographs present orangutans, how they look, where they live, and what they do"--Provided by publisher.

Today, most Westerners still see the war in Afghanistan as a contest between democracy and Islamist fanaticism. That war is real; but it sits atop an older struggle, between Kabul and the countryside, between order and chaos, between a modernist impulse to join the world and the pull of an older Afghanistan: a tribal universe of village republics permeated by Islam. Now, Tamim Ansary draws on his Afghan background, Muslim roots, and Western and Afghan...