It's rare that I read a travel book. It's like taking a "busman's holiday" since I'm on the road 95% of the year but this book looked too funny not to buy!

What impressed me most with this book is that each author was able to put such simple truth into each story while injecting humor. I found that after reading the book... I learned a little more about the regions the authors traveled to and have realized how jaded we are in the US. There's not a simple drug store on every corner. Nor is there a need for the bright lights on every trip. Each experience is unique and described as such.

A very easy read that will have you laughing and learning!

As with any anthology, you will enjoy some essays more than others. Some of my favorites were Taras Grescoe's Absinthe Makes the Heart Grow Fonder about drinking powerful absinthe in Spain, one of the few countries where it is still legally sold; How to Buy a Turkish Rug by Laura Billings about how the experience of haggling over a carpet was more important than the carpet itself; and Laura Fraser's Italian Affair, in which she actually pulls off the feat of writing the whole thing in the second person and makes it work.

Other outstanding entries include Tampax Nightmares by Susan Hack about finding tampons in countries that frown upon such evil devices; The Last Tourist in Mozambique by Mary Roach, who does yoga with the president; and Lisa Michaels's The Man Who Loved Books in Turkey about packing books for the journey and what happens to the books you leave behind.

I love to read anthologies, especially travel anthologies. You get to read some old favorites, read new pieces by authors you like, and discover new writers. Don George is always dependable as editor. In addition to this collection, try his A House Somewhere and The Kindness of Strangers.

So observes Pico Iyer at the end of his foreword to this magical collection, adding that the above is also the reason that "the best trips, like the best love affairs, never really end. "Anyone who has traveled at least a bit, who has loved at least once, or who is ready to be transformed should read this book. High praise is due Don George and Salon.com for gathering such a stirring and tantalizing collection of writings together: in forty short pieces not one dull or sappy note is struck.

For romance, the standouts of this collection are Maxine Rose Schur's "Passionate and Penniless in Paris," about the time she spent with her husband living in a van by the Quai de la Tournelle; Simon Winchester's "Romance in Romania" where the Rolls Royce he happens to be driving brings both him and a young Romanian girl into a beautiful moment that takes its romance from its very fleetingness; Iyer's own short, musical "Bewitched in Bali"; "Fade Into Blue," written in the third person by Amanda Jones; and most memorable of all, Laura Fraser's "Italian Affair," one of the most personal pieces in the book, but written completely in the second person (let's just say it begins with "Let's say your husband leaves you" and ends with her discovery of "la bella vita").

Notable for their adventurous qualities are Bill Belleville's "Looking for Mr. Watson" in the heart of the Florida Everglades; Don Meredith's relaxed brush with death in "Sleeping With Elephants"; Jeffrey Tayler's not-so-relaxed brush with death in "Lost in the Sahara"; editor Don George's surprising fear of climbing Half-Dome in Yosemite while watching his 8- and 10-year-old children scamper up like squirrels--he not afraid for them, he's jealous of them; and Susan Hack's humorous "Tampax Nightmares."

Of course romance and adventure are not mutually exclusive, and many of the stories here exhibit both. The writers of SALON.COM'S WANDERLUST convey the sights, sounds, smells, tastes and feel of the places they go--both externally and inside their own heads. The reader is transported to all seven continents and several states of being (drunk on absinthe, crashing a motorcycle while on heroin, eating the ambrosial sauces of the Memphis World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest). It will be hard to read just a quarter of these stories and not want to make your plane reservations, stuff a new notebook into your backpack and just go.

The item about African writing is an excellent source for other books, new and old, of memoirs of traveling in Africa, not travel guides.

First, let me mention some of the best of the lot. Susan Hack's lament ("Tampax Nightmares") on the pitfalls to finding tampons in Third World countries, and Yemen in particular, was hilarious. (Here, I guess I must admit to being an Insensitive Male.) The essay by Mary Roach ("The Last Tourist In Mozambique") on her interview with that island's President, during which transcendental meditation was discussed and practiced, left me with little doubt as to why that country is in such a wretched condition. Don George's recollection of the family vacation ("Conquering Half Dome") with wife and two kids simply reinforced my intention never to attempt the feat myself - I'm sufficiently afraid of heights. While reading Lucy McCauley's "Expatriate, With Olives", I could feel the sun in my face and the olives in my hand as she stripped the latter from their branches in southern Spain. When Simon Winchester drives a Rolls-Royce Silver Spirit across Europe ("Romance In Romania"), the reaction this magnificent car elicits in a young woman in a dingy Romanian border town is positively poignant. Laura Fraser's getaway to the island of Ischia ("Italian Affair") is, perhaps, what the rest of us can only dream about during a normal day's silent desperation.

Of course, there's the other end of the curve. Wendy Belcher's treatise ("Out Of Africa") examining the opening lines and themes common to a number of travel books on Africa was so excruciatingly ho-hum that I couldn't finish it - the only chapter so dishonored. Barry Yeoman's overwhelming need ("Embraced In Spain") to be adopted by the local crowd in Cádiz, in spite of his nervous stutter and half-out-of-the-closet gay lifestyle, verges on the pathetic. (The fact that he was unconditionally accepted by a group of locals makes for a warm and fuzzy, politically correct ending. But, it was hard to care.) David Downie's record ("Philosophy Au Lait") of the low drama in a Parisian philocafé was so much trivial prattle. (But, then, my shallow character has never concerned itself with life's deeper meanings.) Finally, Karl Greenfeld's self-absorbed jaunt through angst ("Fear, Drugs, and Soccer In Asia") left me hoping he would just snap out of it.

There were quite a few "just OK" chapters, but I'll let you discover those for yourself. Indeed, someone else reading WANDERLUST will likely observe a distribution curve much different than mine - perhaps one skewed to the 1-star or 5-star end of the scale. For me, there was enough good stuff between the covers to make the book ultimately enjoyable. In the end, that's all I really ask.

This is armchair travel at its very best.

While some stories lag behind, as should be expected with 40+ tales, there is certain to be something for everyone. One reviewer found Barry Yeoman's piece about lonliness in Spain and Karl Greenfeld struggle to stay sober in Thailand as two of the worst, but I would highlight the same pieces as two of my favorites.

For any wayward traveler forced to take a break from the road, salon.com's Wanderlust makes for a great escape.