Rating: 
Summary: Not Very Good
Review: I have read various passages in this book, and while the basic intent seems up to snuff, the heart and soul are lacking, and thus the execution falls short. One of the passages which first alerted me to the shortcomings was Bissell's experience riding in a train car, and relating it to the death trains of WWII. Not only is such a comment out of context, but it also seems as irreverent as it is irrelevant.Even though it seems Mr. Bissell traveled to Central Asia, it doesn't seem he ever leaves Manhattan. All of Central Asia is centered about him throughout the book, which would be fine if it were a work of fiction. The book seems warped by a strange field: a sense of insiderism--from beginning to end. Much of it seems overwritten. Alas, it is a first book from a seemingly inexperienced author. Let's hope for more content and less hype next time.
Rating: 
Summary: An Extraordinary Travelogue Indeed
Review: "Chasing the Sea" is the first of what I hope are many, many books from Tom Bissell. The fact that he could make a subject as unfamiliar to most Americans as Central Asia seem so vibrant and alive is a testament to his artistry. He is modest throughout the whole work, admitting up front in his author's note that he is not a scholar, that "Chasing the Sea" is neither history nor reportage nor memoir nor travel guide, but rather "a personal, idiosyncratic account of a place and a people and the problems and conflicts they share." The book, he writes, is a testimony to the perils of ignorance that he once had (and that many still hold, even in the dawning of this imperial age), and that it should not be taken as an alpha-and-omega summation of a part of the world that cannot be contained in 350 pages. To this end, he includes an excellent bibliography and recommended reading list at the end of the book. But what of "Chasing the Sea" itself? It is indeed heartbreaking and hilarious at the same time. I can't remember the last book I read that could dicuss Depeche Mode and Genghis Khan, Tamerlane and Tolkien, Eminem and England's "Great Game" with Russia, with such intelligence, ease, and agility, and make them all essential and connected to the point of the tale. Bissell alternates between his travels through Uzbekistan and the neighboring countries (the modern, the "known") and the histories of the area (the ancient, the forgotten) and it seems like just when you're getting overloaded with the Soviet's mishandling of the land or the horrible death of Arthur Conolly in Bukhara, Bissell switches gears back to the 21st-century and takes you along with him as he tries, for your sake and his, to understand the people of Central Asia. It happens with such lyric beauty that you don't mind the history lesson in the least. In fact, you
want more, as you realize you are perhaps living in the book's "Eighth Chapter." I can't understand these accusations from some reviewers that "Chasing the Sea" is "austere," "condescending," "trite," or "hoity-toity." It is anything but. (And Bissell, who hails from Michigan's Upper Peninsula, and who has written wholeheartedly about his love of speed metal, horror movies, and video games -- and self-deprecatingly about his distaste for the writing of Samuel Beckett and Henry James -- is certainly anything but a snob.) I would ask those who fear that Bissell is looking down upon the "natives" -- as one misguided negative review put it -- to read the end of Chapter 5, which is subtitled, affectionately, "Sacred Spaces." The author has fallen so in love with Uzbekistan that on a tour through Bukhara's Jewish Quarter, he suddenly tells his host Mila that he wants to buy an apartment she's put up for sale: "I tallied the bribes I would almost certainly be required to pay for a new refrigerator, a good phone connection, and consistent mail delivery. I rehearsed the explanations I would just as certainly be required to give my family and friends. I thought of the loneliness, the exhilarated transformation, of walking these streets as though they were my own. I imagined long days of waiting for plumbers and electricians to show up, long nights of reading in this courtyard as the moon surfaced in the sky, long Saturdays of setting up mousetraps and painting these rooms and working in the garden, and the long weeks and months of wondering what on earth I had done, what on earth I was trying to prove, what correlative might remain after the act of moving here had lost significance to everyone but me." Bissell comes to his senses and admits that, "It was just a thought. A romantic but . . . impossible thought," to which Mila replies, "Aren't all the best thoughts romantic?" If anything, the author is perhaps too attached to his subject, but if this is a failing, it is a failing of the most beautiful and humane kind. The vagaries and gorilla dust that the negative reviewers are spewing makes it obvious that most of them haven't even read this book. Any intelligent potential reader should contrast these reviews with the testimonies from ex-Peace Corps members and others who are actually willing to attach their names to their words. Or, better yet, go to your local bookstore and read any page of "Chasing the Sea" to understand how excellent a book it is. As the author himself writes, quite beautifully: "The world, finally, is no longer large, and to ignore it likely requires more effort than simply to take notice. Now that we have suffered this truth, and suffered it deeply, we might take care to remember how comparatively fortunate we are as Americans. Any attempt to recognize American 'luckiness' will, I do not doubt, terrify many, anger some, and offer others mind-cleansing reassurance. Three things this recognition is not, and should never be: a call to arms, a lullaby, or a reason to stay home." Amen to that, and thank you Mr. Bissell.
Rating:
Summary: A Stunning Book
Review: This was one of my favorite books from last year. It's not quite a travelogue, memoir, or history, but rather all three bracketed by what may be the worst ecological disaster of all time. It's a relatively easy to read and inoffensive book, the writing is maximalist as opposed to minimilist which is not going to be for every one but I really enjoyed it. What was so good about this book was that none of the three pillars (history, travelogue, and memoir) of the book would have worked on its own but together create an original work, beautifully paced that is engaging but also incredibly educational. It takes pretty amazing talent to pull something like that off. The only other book I've ever read that was comparable was Martin Amis' Koba The Dread. Anyway, the bad reviews of this book are just weird and I can only imagine come from some jilted lover or high school nemesis but they're disheartening to see pointed as they are at such a big hearted work. The anonymity of the internet brings out the worst in people.
Rating: 
Summary: The McWeeniazation of Central Asia
Review: I lived in Central Asia, both as a student and a soldier. Judging by this book, Tom Bissell lived in the United States and wrote this book based on his experiences reading Travel Planet guides in Starbucks. The book is written in a condescending tone, and when it is not merely condescending, it is dehumanizing towards the native population. How many people did Tom actually befriend? How many women did he date? How many Central Asians did he share a laugh or a smoke with? From the tenor, tone, and content of this book, apparently none. And a little note to Tom--if you're going to write your own reviews, you ought to strive for a little subtlety. And come to think of it, the same could be said for your future books. Life is not a creative writing workshop assignment. As Hemingway said, "The world is a fine place and worth fighting for."
Rating:
Summary: Don't be confused by some of these reviews
Review: as I was initially. I don't know where these negative reviews are coming from. Those people must've read a different book than me. I found out about "Chasing the Sea" from Mr. Bissell's bio in "The Believer" (he's an almost-regular contributor) and can say that his book contains some of the most beautiful, thoughtful, and insightful writing I've read in a long time, on any subject. And to know that it all came from an American writer, living in my time, who is roughly the same age as I am, gives me hope that good, honest writing, devoid of the concerns of any kind of "school" or "group" is still alive and thriving in our country today. I didn't know anything about Uzbekistan, and, to be honest, I wasn't really that interested in the subject when I started reading, but I was sucked into this book from the very first page. All good writing does that, concerns itself with language and trusts the reader. Mr. Bissell can be funny at times and heartbreaking at others. He mixes the highbrow and the lowbrow together (as all great literature should) and gives the reader what every writer should: a further connection with humanity.
Rating: 
Summary: How to Eat a Sheep's Head
Review: Or how not to;one of the most vivid scenes in this vivid book centers on Bissell's confronting a sheep's head that, for politeness's sake, he must sample.
The book is the story of Bissell's travels in Uzbekistan in 2001, when he returned to the scene of his truncated stint as a Peace Corps volunteer in the mid 1990s--illness cut short his service at that time--illness, and a certain lack of commitment to the cause. One of the funnier things in the book is his riff on the Peace Corps.
His mission this time is to write an article about the vanishing Aral Sea, but it takes Bissell a long time to get there in the company of a a young Uzbek called Rustam, who plays Sancho Panza to Bissell's Don Quixote. Readers thus learn more about the country's past and present than about the ecological disaster that is the Aral Sea, although it too gets its chance at the end of the book.
For me, the considerable charm of the story was the unique quality of Bissell's voice. He comes across as funny, smart, compassionate and serious. Although some readers may be put off by the meandering quality of the narrative, it seems to reflect the author's openness to experience, and to the people he meets along the way. Bissell has views on everything, and he is not afraid to state them.
This book may not persuade you to visit Uzbekistan, but it will tell you what this Central Asian country is and was like and it will introduce you to the people who live there. Bissell also works a lot of history in and around the story of his adventures, and does so in a very palatable way.
In conclusion, if you like good travel writing, you will like this book; if you like opinionated travel writing, you will like it even better.
Rating: 
Summary: Literate and informative...
Review: I enjoyed this view into a land long-hidden from western eyes. Mr. Bissell's youthful voice and clear reporting of people and places had me quoting the book to people. I loved the dialogue he described with his guide and others and enjoyed his wry sense of humour and the insider view of the Peace Corps as well. However, the glib viewpoint towards Islam in Central Asia was surprising and disappointing, as was what I perceived to be the author's bias and lack of curiosity about it.
Rating:
Summary: Lowdown and Highdown
Review: What the holy moly is it with this book? A bunch of one-stars, and bunch of five-stars, and not much in between. I have a theory (I just read it). Here's that theory: This is a book that takes its time to do what it does, and it doesn't care to obey the accepted rules of nonfiction. I think Mr. Bissell, the author, very self-consciously tried to write a piece of Literature. I also think he cares more about the writing than the politics or journalysis. And you are either down with that or you're not. You either like the writing or you don't. Plenty of people are turned off by Art and Literature, and here's a tome about a current-eventsy part of the world that has had little recent Art about it. Confusion! (maybe). I happened to really love Chasing the Sea, but what I'm saying is that I sort of see why a certain sort of person wouldn't. I don't think Bissell is a racist or white supremecist, though, as one reviewer does. That's kooky. All Peace Corps volunteers will love it, though, as will fans of Theroux or Matthieson.
Rating:
Summary: The cover and the contents vary widely
Review: A few months back I picked up a fascinating book that recounted the experience of a young American fresh out of college who moved to Siberia. The book, "Siberia Bound: Chasing the American Dream on Russia's Wide Frontier", by Alexander Blakeley, is well written, witty, humorous and very informative. Readers could relate to Blakeley's book at different levels, from the personal to the deeply philosophical. When I saw another book, this time about Central Asia, with the stark and yet intriguing picture of ships stranded on land, with a title called "Chasing the Sea", and maps on the inside cover, and I looked at the blurbs and skimmed a few pages, I thought to myself that this promises to be another interesting read. I guess preferences in reading are rather personal, so what someone likes very much the next person could detest completely. Yet, one would think that there are some minimum objective criteria about a piece of non-fiction, such as a congruence between the title and the contents. In the case of "Chasing the Sea", I was completely disappointed, there is hardly any material about the disappearing Aral Sea nor does the book present any insights about the social and economic changes in Central Asia, but there is a lot of other material that is poorly written and pointless.
Rating:
Summary: Garbage!
Review: This is the worst travel book I've ever read! It is totally ignorant! Tom Bissell should have stayed out in the sticks of Escanaba, Michigan. What's the point of travelling if it only makes you a more strident white supremacist? The book contains loads of very racist remarks about Uzbeks and Central Asians. He frequently strays away from his intended subject matter, which was supposed to be the Aral Sea, to share his air-head sensibilities. This book is a total waste of time and no one who truly values being informed would enjoy a book about Central Asia written by an Archie Bunker wannabe! This book really makes Americans look like stupid fools.
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