Lost in Venice: and Other Places

You may have traveled to some of these destinations yourself, but chances are you've never become tangled in the predicaments that this pair of travelers has encountered. Beverly Paik is looking for adventure beyond the ordinary and usually stumbles onto it while her husband, always the skeptic, is traveling with her. The dialogue between them runs like a continuous thread, whether they are stepping onto a glacier from a helicopter or climbing among the ruins of a remote archeological site. The unexpected is always about to happen, whether on the streets of Paris, in a Tibetan monastery, or in the rain forests of Costa Rica.

The highlights of Lost in Venice are the sympathetic and revealing portraits of the people that they meet along the way. There are interesting nuggets of information and commentary deftly tucked into each episode. Whether you are flying halfway round the world or happily ensconced at home, reading these endearing anecdotes will give the illusion of trudging right along beside them. The author claims her stories are ninety percent truth and ten percent fiction. Your challenge is to decide what is fictional and what is real.