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Vietnam

READING AND TRAVEL GUIDE

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Order an essential package, and we'll ship any additional items for free. We offer a mix of guidebooks, maps, field guides, novels and books on art, architecture, history, nature and culture.

Essential Reading

Item EXVNM36. Buy these 4 items as a set for $59 including shipping, 20% off the retail price.
With free shipping on anything else you order.

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The Eaves of Heaven, A Life in Three Wars

The Eaves of Heaven, A Life in Three Wars

by Andrew X. Pham

  • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR
  • 2009
  • PAPER
  • 320 PAGES

Pham recounts the story of his father's life during the French occupation, Japanese invasion and the American War, weaving such momentous events with anecdotes from his childhood and details of family, friends, food and daily life. (VNM120, $16.00)

Vietnam, A Traveler's Literary Companion

Vietnam, A Traveler's Literary Companion

by John Balaban | Nguyen Qui Duc

  • ANTHOLOGY
  • 1996
  • PAPER
  • 239 PAGES
  • COMING IN FEBRUARY

From rain forest and rural countryside to the cities, these 17 stories from Vietnam's finest writers explore Vietnam's landscapes, myths and changing traditions. (VNM04, $14.95)

Eyewitness Guide Vietnam and Angkor Wat

Eyewitness Guide Vietnam and Angkor Wat

by Eyewitness Guides

  • GUIDEBOOK
  • 2011
  • PAPER
  • 312 PAGES

Featuring innovative site diagrams, local maps and hundreds of color photographs, this handy companion introduces the culture, history and attractions of Vietnam. (VNM102, $25.00)

Vietnam Map

Vietnam Map

by ITMB

  • 2005
  • MAP

A detailed travel map of Vietnam at a scale of 1:1,000,000. (VNM05, $12.95)

 
Culture Smart! Vietnam

Culture Smart! Vietnam


by Geoffrey Murray

  • GUIDEBOOK
  • 2008
  • PAPER
  • 168 PAGES

Take along this concise, well-illustrated and practical guide to local customs, etiquette and culture. (VNM87, $9.95)

Insight Guide Vietnam

Insight Guide Vietnam


by Insight Guides | Scott Rutherford

  • GUIDEBOOK
  • 2011
  • PAPER
  • 384 PAGES

A highly recommended guide to history, culture and popular destinations, featuring essays, informative maps and photographs. (VNM02, $24.99)

Lonely Planet Vietnam

Lonely Planet Vietnam


by Lonely Planet

  • GUIDEBOOK
  • 2009
  • PAPER
  • 540 PAGES

This comprehensive practical guide includes local and regional color maps, a section of photographs and chapters on history, culture and attractions. (VNM126, $24.99)

Lonely Planet Vietnamese Phrasebook

Lonely Planet Vietnamese Phrasebook


by Nguyen Xuanthu

  • LANGUAGE & PHRASEBOOKS
  • 2010
  • PAPER
  • 284 PAGES

A handy palm-sized guide to pronunciation, grammar and essential vocabulary for the traveler. (VNM20, $8.99)

Vietnamese, A Language Map

Vietnamese, A Language Map


by Kristine K. Kershul

  • LANGUAGE & PHRASEBOOKS
  • 2002
  • PLASTIC CARD

This durable foldout card, featuring 1,000 words and phrases, works as a quick reference for travelers. (VNM82, $7.95)

Communion, A Culinary Journey Through Vietnam

Communion, A Culinary Journey Through Vietnam


by Kim Fay

  • FOOD
  • 2010
  • PAPER
  • 293 PAGES

Fay recounts in savory detail a five-week journey with two friends from Hanoi to Saigon in search of the traditions, rituals and pleasures of food from local markets and street foods to haute cuisine. (VNM147, $19.95)

Fire in the Lake

Fire in the Lake


by Frances FitzGerald

  • HISTORY
  • 2002
  • PAPER
  • 496 PAGES

A classic historical, political and cultural portrait of a nation at war, this powerful book won both the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award. FitzGerald, a staff writer at the New Yorker and a reporter in Vietnam, presents a vivid image of a revolution. (VNM12, $18.99)

Shadows and Wind

Shadows and Wind


by Robert Templer

  • CULTURAL PORTRAIT
  • 1999
  • PAPER
  • 398 PAGES

A British journalist based in Vietnam, Templer cuts through myth and legend to offer a lively, opinionated portrait of contemporary Vietnam. (VNM43, $17.00)

The Fog of War

The Fog of War


by Robert S. McNamara | Errol Morris

  • HISTORY
  • 2004
  • DVD

Morris keeps a tight focus on the haunted and candid Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in this riveting examination of the U.S. in Vietnam. The 95-minute film won an Oscar in 2003 for best documentary. (VNM83, $14.94)

Understanding Vietnam

Understanding Vietnam


by Neil Jamieson

  • CULTURAL PORTRAIT
  • 1995
  • PAPER
  • 428 PAGES

Jamieson's ambitious primer addresses politics, social history, village life, structural renewal, literature and the arts, illuminating the Vietnamese worldview with insight and depth. It's a terrific introduction to Vietnam. (VNM01, $27.95)

Vietnam Now, A Reporter Returns

Vietnam Now, A Reporter Returns


by David Lamb

  • CULTURAL PORTRAIT
  • 2003
  • PAPER
  • 288 PAGES

An insightful portrait of contemporary Vietnam by a Los Angeles Times foreign correspondent and National Geographic writer. Lamb interweaves stories of Vietnam today with his own experiences and memories as a young reporter for UPI during the war. (VNM47, $17.00)

Vietnam, Rising Dragon

Vietnam, Rising Dragon


by Bill Hayton

  • HISTORY
  • 2011
  • PAPER
  • 272 PAGES

The veteran BBC newsman covers the tangled politics, rapidly changing economy, culture, history and people of Vietnam with great insight in this timely portrait of a nation in transition. (VNM134, $22.00)

Vietnam: Journeys of Body, Mind, and Spirit

Vietnam: Journeys of Body, Mind, and Spirit


by Nguyen Van Huy | Laurel Kendall

  • CULTURAL PORTRAIT
  • 2003
  • PAPER
  • 303 PAGES

A marvelously illustrated portrait of culture and society in contemporary Vietnam, featuring informed essays by diverse contributors with accompanying color photographs. (VNM66, $50.00)

Vietnam Journeys

Vietnam Journeys


by Charles Fields

  • ART & ARCHITECTURE
  • 2011
  • HARD COVER
  • 224 PAGES

Photographer and traveler Charles Fields portrays the cultures and landscapes of Vietnam from the World Heritage Site of Hue and the Phung Hiep floating market to its forests and coastline in stunning color photographs. (VNM138, $50.00)

Catfish and Mandala, A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam

Catfish and Mandala, A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam


by Andrew X. Pham

  • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR
  • 2000
  • PAPER
  • 344 PAGES

Much more than the story of a road trip, this book combines the author's family history with his many and often-gritty adventures by bicycle through foreign lands including Mexico, Japan and, notably, Vietnam. (VNM50, $16.00)

Dispatches

Dispatches


by Michael Herr

  • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR
  • 2009
  • HARD COVER
  • 296 PAGES

Robert Stone introduces this Everyman's Library edition of Herr's impressionistic, affecting memoir of his time as a war correspondent in Vietnam, called by the New York Times the best book yet to be written about the war. (VNM03, $24.00)

The River's Tale, A Year on the Mekong

The River's Tale, A Year on the Mekong


by Edward Gargan

  • TRAVEL NARRATIVE
  • 2003
  • PAPER
  • 352 PAGES

A personal, probing chronicle of a 3,000 mile journey on the river from its source in China through Tibet, Burma, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia to the Mekong Delta in Vietnam. (SEA33, $15.95)

The Sacred Willow, Four Generations in the Life of a Vietnamese Family

The Sacred Willow, Four Generations in the Life of a Vietnamese Family


by Duong Van Mai Elliott

  • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR
  • 2000
  • PAPER
  • 506 PAGES

This vivid family saga, beginning with the author's great-grandfather, captures the life and momentous history of Vietnam over the last 100 years. (VNM39, $24.99)

A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain

A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain


by Robert Olen Butler

  • ANTHOLOGY
  • 2001
  • PAPER
  • 249 PAGES

Winner of the 1993 Pulitzer Prize, this collection of 15 short stories captures the spirit of Vietnam through a juxtaposition of American and Vietnamese perspectives and settings. (VNM21, $14.00)

Paradise of the Blind

Paradise of the Blind


by Duong Thu Huong

  • LITERATURE
  • 2002
  • PAPER
  • 270 PAGES

Duong Thu Huong's popular novel captures the live of three women in an extended family -- and the struggle for economic well being in the throes of failed land reform in the 1980s. (VNM30, $13.99)

The Quiet American

The Quiet American


by Graham Greene

  • LITERATURE
  • 2004
  • PAPER
  • 180 PAGES
  • FAVORITE

A classic, this is the most famous Western work of fiction on Vietnam. Greene writes of a love triangle between a war correspondent, his Vietnamese consort and an optimistic young American during the last days of French rule. (VNM08, $16.00)

The Sorrow of War, A Novel of North Vietnam

The Sorrow of War, A Novel of North Vietnam


by Bao Ninh

  • LITERATURE
  • 1996
  • PAPER
  • 213 PAGES

A powerful novel by a former North Vietnamese soldier, this short book captures the appalling conditions of war, alternating vivid scenes from the front lines with flashbacks from the protagonist's rural youth. (VNM07, $15.00)

The Things They Carried

The Things They Carried


by Tim O'Brien

  • LITERATURE
  • 2009
  • PAPER
  • 246 PAGES

National Book Award-winner O'Brien captures the daily life of a soldier in Vietnam in this loosely structured, powerful collection of stories. (VNM32, $14.95)

Birds of Southeast Asia

Birds of Southeast Asia


by Craig Robson

  • FIELD GUIDE
  • 2005
  • PAPER
  • 304 PAGES

This authoritative, masterfully illustrated guide, featuring 140 color plates covering 1,270 species throughout the region, also includes Malaysia, Burma, Borneo and Indonesia. (SEA49, $35.00)

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Longitude provides recommended reading for travelers in partnership with the leading tour operators and travel programs for hundreds of destinations worldwide. We've got the classic, new and hard-to-find books and maps to help you get the most out of your adventures.