A Strange Kind of Paradise

Sam Miller has written a wonderfully witty, wise, idiosyncratic and properly hybrid book that achieves the near-impossible. It is at once a touching personal memoir, a droll and discursive travelogue and an erudite work of literary criticism which somehow manages to be, at the same time, a hugely entertaining history of the world's often confused dialogue with South Asia over three thousand years. It is also, almost as an after-thought, a most moving love letter to India.

William Dalrymple, author of City of Djinns

Laconic and engaging… [An] attractive book.

David Gilmour, Literary Review

Wide-ranging and hugely entertaining.

Peter Parker, Spectator

Fascinating.

Tarquin Hall, Sunday Times

Delightfully eccentric… A very readable account… Miller is the master of the must-read footnote, while matching the travel writer Eric Newby in his acute descriptions of contemporary life in India.

Victor Mallet, Financial Times

[Miller] is a congenial guide. He has a fantastically sharp eye… Amid a torrent of sparkling details, what stands out is Miller's heartfelt love for the country.

Alex Von Tunzelmann, Evening Standard

Fresh and forthright… Miller has a fantastically sharp eye for quirky details.

Alex Von Tunzelman, Scotsman

Those who know India will find his account sensitively reflects most aspects of that complex land; those who do not know it could hardly do better than to start here.

John Ure, Country Life

Far more than a simple narrative of experiences… A fascinating mixture of detailed descriptions spiced by revealing anecdotes, wild untruths and misunderstood behavior.

The Bay (Swansea)

Dry, funny and curiously British.

Wanderlust Magazine

It depicts the much-explored India in new and inventive ways, full of fascinating details that leave one hungry for adventures in the land of spices and elephants.

Lola Peploe, Another Magazine

Rich

Christopher Hirst, Independent

This is a scholarly, readable and wonderfully eccentric homage to India as seen through foreign eyes

Good Book Guide

Spellbinding

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