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Summary: Bill has a good look at Australia
Review: Bill Bryson makes several trips around and across Australia by train, plane and car. He goes boogie boarding and snorkling - he drives across the desert and finds interesting facts about each place he visits. He has done his homework - his facts are spot on. Funny and a really good read.
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Summary: Stereotype-free...fair dinkum
Review: Thank you, thank you, thank you, Bill. As a proud Australian, it has been a never-ending source of irritation that Australia is forever portrayed as a land of beer-swilling "yobbos" who say "cobber" and "fair dinkum" rather a lot. For instance, 'The Simpsons' - usually such a witty, clever and insightful show - completely missed the point in their Australian episode. Finally, someone has managed to capture a bit of the character of this great country. He releases it from the shackles of the Paul Hogan stereotype.This is a terrific read. Bryson has, mercifully, gone well and truly off the beaten track to explore many different parts of Australia - the cities, the outback, the tropics, and everything else in between. But as ever with a Bill Bryson book, more than the destination itself, the pleasure is in getting there. Laugh-out-loud moments abound, though perhaps more in the restrained way of "A Walk in the Woods", as opposed to the guffaw-fest that is "Neither Here Nor There". You don't have to be at all familiar with Australia to appreciate and enjoy this book. I am, sadly, one of those Australians to which Bryson refers that has never seen Ayers Rock / Uluru myself. In fact, I have never been to the majority of places Bryson visits. It was a revelation for me, too. Bryson once again recounts numerous historical and trivial anecdotes which, together with his unique view of the world, elevate this book well above the mere travel genre. This is insightful, this is informative, this is FUNNY. Perversely, my only criticism is perhaps that he likes Australia a little too much. God knows, I'm so pleased that he does. However, he is, I believe, at his best when distressed. Dull and drab places, and stupid, mindless people bring out the devil in Bill Bryson, and have always proven to be useful comic fair. There are elements of that here - his body boarding experience, his views on Canberra, and his trials and tribulations with hotel receptionists in Darwin - but at the end of the day, opportunities to vent his sarcastic wit are somewhat limited. Being an enthusiastic and devoted fan of the great Stephen Katz, I would also have loved to have seen him deal with the hardships of outback Australia. He would have absolutely LOATHED it. Read this book. It is a treat.
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Summary: A hilarious account of travel down under
Review: Bill Bryson's "Sunburned Country" is an incredibly funny and informative account of Australia. "The Great Barrier Reef contains at least 1500 species of fish, 400 types of coral and 4000 varieties of molluscs, but those are essentially just guesses" says Mr Bryson. He then goes on to say that no one has ever attempted a comprehensive survey because the Great Barrier Reef is just "too big a job". Like all his other accounts of travel around the world, the narrator's sarcasm is very evident and this leaves the reader in stitches. "Sunburned Country"is an extremely enjoyable and fascinating read. I also recommend Mr Bryson's other books such as "Notes from a Small Island" and "The Lost Continent".
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Summary: Australia Discovered At Last!
Review: Bill Bryson travels Australia - by train, plane and car, investigates cities and the lonely vast outback, goes boogie boarding in the surf (always mindful of sharks, rips, seasnakes and jellyfish) and generally has a great time. Bill has done his homework - I can vouch for many of his tales - a good read.
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Summary: One of Bryson's best books
Review: Bryson's best book is "Notes From a Small Island," about traveling in Great Britain. It's one of the funniest books I've read. The British are funny, and Bryson knows them well after living in Britain for 20+ years. His book about Australia, "In a Sunburned Country," is also entertaining. He studied Australian history, met many interesting locals, etc. After reading it, I feel like an expert on Australia and its people. His book about Europe, "Neither Here Nor There," isn't so good. The problem is that he speaks no languages other than English. He didn't talk to anyone on this trip. Wwithout any characters (other than Bryson) the book isn't engaging. The book has only one joke, which he repeats: "The waiter/hotel clerk/taxi driver didn't speak English so I tried to make him understand that I needed..." Some of these moments are quite funny, but they don't constitute a book. Bryson didn't study the places he visits. Unlike the Australian book, you learn almost nothing about the countries he visited. Bryson's book about America, "I'm a Stranger Here Myself," failed to make me laugh. It reads like a series of Erma Bombeck columns. Bryson comments about various aspects of his life in a small town in New England. Not other people's lives, which might have been interesting, but only about his domestic life. I got only a few chapters into his book about the Appalachian Trail, "A Walk in the Woods." I wasn't amused that two people with no backpacking experience would attempt a six-month hike. After several chapters of Bryson repeating one joke -- "I know nothing about any of this!" -- I stopped reading. This suggests that the old advice "write about what you know" is worth following. It also made me realize that traveling is only enjoyable if you do two things: meet interesting people, preferably by speaking their language; and studying the area you're visiting. Review by Thomas David Kehoe, author of "Hearts and Minds: How Our Brains Are Hardwired for Relationships"
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Summary: Brilliant....
Review: I approached this book with a fair bit of skepticism because, lets face it, how interesting can a 350 page book about a scarcely known land be? To be perfectly fair though, I must say that I was surprisingly bowled over. Bill Bryson is a brilliant author who was able to inject much life and wit into, what could have quite easily been a phenomenally boring and dry piece. In addition, I would highly suggest the CD versions of Bryson's books to absorb the full effect of his comedic prowess. In short, I couldn't have been happier with this book and that's all I've got to say about that. Read the book and you'll soon understand that last sentence!
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Summary: America's finest travel writer scores again
Review: In this, yet another jewel in Bryson's considerable literary crown, the author takes his readership into the exotic, eccentric and dangerous world of Australia. Using his unique blend of travellouge, history and personal memoir Bryson paints a fascinating portrait of a nation rich in culture and vast in space but unfortunately overlooked by much of the rest of the world.
Using his unique brand of scatalogical humor and personal insight (his description of not only how he sleeps but how he reacts to fear inspires peals of raging laughter)Bryson journeys throughout Australia's varied continent absorbing many of her treasures and traps. IN A SUNBURNED COUNTRY, Bryson debunks many misconceptions about the former British Penal Colony as well as holds up the special personalities that make her citizens stand proud. He goes beyond the "Steve Irwin and Crocodile Dundee" stereotypes and paints a picture of a nation filled with world class intellectuals and athletes.
He also refuses to pull any punches as he frequently tempers the humor with many sobering truths (the treatment of the Aboriginies to mention just one example). That he can be so balanced is a testament to his talent as a writer.
According to Bryson, Australia is a country filled with the most hostile ecosystem on earth and yet thrives with perhaps the most diverse biological assortment known to man. It is a special place. I may not be able to afford a trip yet. But Bryson's book is almost as good as being there.
Almost.
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Summary: Fantastic Read; Witty and True
Review: My wife and I just got back from our honeymoon in Australia and we had this book recommended to us. I'm reading it aloud to her and I can tell that we're going to like this book when the author, in the acknowledgments, says that he would like to thank the entire country of Australia because they're all just so wonderfully nice and helpful. That resonated so very true to our experience that we've been hooked on the book ever since. Now that we're in a few chapters, it's easy to make comparisons between Bryson's writing style and that of the late Douglas Adams in Last Chance to See (esp. the "Here Be Chickens" chapter) -- his persistently chipper and witty writing in the face of more venom and teeth than most of the world has seen makes this a highly entertaining read.
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Summary: A Must Reading Before Going to Australia
Review: Bill Bryson has written a very entertaining and very informative travelog about Australia. He begins with an analysis of just how neglected this country is from our current media. Ask yourself, when was the last time you saw an article in the newspaper about Australia. Fortunately, Bryson has set out to do justice. While relating his adventures wandering around the country on long drives that most of us would fly over, he also fills us in on the history of this island/continent, beyond the commonly known convict dumping ground part. Despite being keenly aware of all the dangerous and deadly snakes, spiders and jellies, Bryson manages to make it through unscathed, despite the hunger of some very mean dogs. He also discusses the unique ecology of the land, and the various problems caused by introduced species: rabbits, foxes, camels and others. This is all done with great humor, and his description of cricket radio commentary had me roaring with laughter. Equally interesting are Bryson's descriptions of Australians, contemporary individuals he meets on his wanderings as wel as the famous and infamous from history. For those who wish to explore some more of Australia, there is a valuable bibliography at the end.
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Summary: Quick Praise for Travellers and Leisure Readers
Review: I'm headed to Australia in a couple of months and generally don't care to add to my heavy university reading any labor-intensive books, but Bryson's In a Sunburnt Country both gave me the vocabulary to talk about and further explore Australian literature and entertained me. I would highly recommend this book to anyone but xenophobics and illiterates. It's a comfortable adventure through a decidedly uncomfortable land. My only ciriticism is that, as someone who plans to backpack into the outback, it lacks in description of the excitement of the more athletic endeavors that Australia has to offer. But that is a small concern in light of the depth of factual and whimsical information conveyed without alerting the reader that he or she is consuming a lot.
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