Picture Palace - Paul Theroux

This travelogue was written in the late 1980's (published 1983). Its the story of a voyage downstream on the Yangtze River. The style is light and almost chatty in parts but the voyage doesn't come across as exciting or particularly adventurous. It is at best, interesting, and at times humourous. Theroux shares the voyage with a group of millionaires and he seems to find them quite amusing. Half of them, he says, have been to China before and consider themselves seasoned travellers, but the other half are just novices. Some insist on calling Mao 'Mayo' and get confused between Fuji and Fiji. Theroux compares various landmarks along the ...  Read the complete review