Coswell's Guide to Tambralinga: A Novel [Hardcover]

Scott Landers (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 23, 2004

A sure-handed fiction debut takes a darkly comic and unsettling look at the quest for adventure in exotic lands

In a last-ditch effort to save their marriage, Conrad and Lucy Shermer embark on a second honeymoon in the fashionably exotic--and politically volatile--Southeast Asian nation of Tambralinga. They soon separate, Lucy (guidebook in hand) in quest of authentic cultural experience on the mainland while Conrad searches a tourist island for an infamous brothel. From the outset, both expeditions are in danger of devolving into farce. Conrad, torn between his staid, paternal nature and his desire to play the libertine in this tropical setting, finds himself caught in a strange vortex of sexual and power politics, stumbling upon "authentic" experiences he'd sought to avoid. At the same time, Lucy's internal compass sends her on adventures quite beyond the parameters of her carefully plotted itinerary, forcing her to confront realities at odds with the romantic portrait promoted by her guidebook.
In this utterly unpredictable first novel, Scott Landers exposes with wry wit our cherished illusions about journeys of self-discovery and explores the changes that really do happen when we venture into the unknown.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This ambitious first novel invites comparisons with Alex Garland's The Beach, though it is more grown-up and better written. Like Garland, Landers puts dissatisfied Westerners seeking fulfillment in a deceptively idyllic Southeast Asia, in this case the fictional island of Tambralinga. At the center is Conrad, a meek computer systems analyst on a desperate second honeymoon with Lucy, who's furious at him for losing her all-important guidebook. Fearing "that he was missing it, that better half of existence, the throbbing center of what it meant to be alive," Conrad heads to a brothel on another island, while Lucy finds the guidebook and embarks on her own adventure. The couple's estrangement permits Landers to detail well-rendered but fairly typical highlights of their tours: Buddhist monks with mystical powers, star-lit beach trysts, secret swimming spots, prostitution and drug use, all set against the background of a hazily sketched political-religious conflict. But if Landers sometimes succumbs to travel-novel clichés, his Conrad is older and more complex, imbued with a welcome skepticism—a tired detachment that evokes Fowler from The Quiet American—about the "appallingly deliberate" nature of adventure tourism in Asia. Toward the end, thoughtfulness gives way to a flurry of action and implausible coincidences. But readers will find the ride, half jungle cruise and half roller coaster, worth the price of admission.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Conrad Shermer is ruing the day he agreed to take his wife, Lucy, to the Southeast Asian country of Tambralinga. Much as he longs to play the sophisticated traveler, he is content to remain in the hammock at his beach hut sipping tropical drinks and ignoring his imploding marriage. Then a particularly nasty fight with his wife, coupled with an alluring description of the local brothel, sends him out the door. Over the ensuing days, Conrad, traveling far from the beach resorts, winds up sleeping on the forest floor outside a Buddhist temple and somehow rediscovering the feeling of being seven years old on Christmas morning. Meanwhile, Lucy, slavishly devoted to accumulating the cultural experiences outlined in her guidebook, ends up in a heated sexual competition for the attentions of a suave government official. She wins the contest but discovers he is a spokesman for a violent and repressive regime. In this offbeat first novel, Landers puts a wry spin on the theme of self-discovery, suggesting that jealousy, hardship, and disillusionment are good for the soul. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux; First Edition edition (June 23, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374130213
• ISBN-13: 978-0374130213
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,954,946 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Heated romantic adventures, September 6, 2004

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Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Coswell's Guide to Tambralinga: A Novel (Hardcover)

In Scott Landers' Coswell's Guide To Tambralinga Conrad Shermer rues the day he agreed to take his wife Lucy to the Asian country Tambralinga: all he wants is tropical relaxation, but life with Lucy is anything but quiet, and a nasty fight between them sends him into the back roads of Tambralinga, to a local brothel and a series of native encounters far from the resort he came for - while Lucy ends up in her own heated romantic adventures.