A Season in Heaven: True Tales from the Road to Kathmandu

In this book, the author has collected statements, stories, diary entries and the like from thirty seven people, as well as recording his own memories, all of the ‘Road to Kathmandu' (or ‘Doing India', ‘the Hippie Trail', etc) - travels from 1965 to 1975.

With so many contributors, we get a variety of viewpoints from Brits, Americans, Europeans, Aussies & Kiwis and even Japanese. It well covers the ‘main route' - Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Nepal & a brief mention for Sri Lanka. India is well covered off - split into many chapters for the different States.

Split into seasons, and trying to bring together all of these memories and opinions, the books tries to give a background to the why, the what was expected, the what were the experiences, and the actual mechanics of the travel, the lifestyle, the spiritual & religious experience.

It is an interesting era, one I missed out on by a long period, but one I probably would have enjoyed experiencing. There was a lot to look forward to with this book, but for me it under-delivered. I really struggle with the format - there was a paragraph from one contributor, a couple of pages from the next. It was either disjointed, or repetitive, and lacked a flow. It did make it easy to read in short bursts, but overall it didn't work. There is also the unfortunate problem that reading about these idealistic, baby-boomers is really quite dull. Don't get me wrong - it was a part of the culture that i would have been comfortable enough taking part it, it just isn't interesting to read about as a third party. I think the readers who would enjoy this book the most are those looking to read about the times they spent - to reminisce, remember - even fill in some gaps maybe.

3 stars.