Why did I love this book?
I have read and re-read News from Tartary countless times, and the pages of my paperback copy are no longer attached to its spine. Its author, Peter Fleming, was the elder brother of writer Ian Fleming, who, it is said, modeled his fictional hero, James Bond, upon the exploits of his elder sibling.
The book is a rip-roaring, real-life adventure set in the mid-1930s (the best time for exploration). Peter, a special correspondent for The Times newspaper, sets off on a six-month trek overland, by horse and camel, from Peking, China, to Kashmir, in British India. It is superbly written—travel literature at its finest—and an evocative record of a lost era in history, just before WW2 and the Chinese Civil War.
1 author picked News from Tartary as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
Peter Fleming's account of his 1935 bid to travel the ancient trade route from China to India known as the 'Silk Road'.