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Rating: 
Summary: Educational and useful for planning a trip.
Review: As both a motorcyclist and a traveller, I found this book both an interesting read and useful for planning a trip to Vietnam.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent help in planning a visit to Vietnam
Review: As someone who enjoys motorcycle travel overseas, I found this book invaluable for planning my own motorcycle tour in Vietnam. Some reviews have said the writer is 'shallow' etc, but I think his comments are dead on.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting portrait of the new Vietnam in a travelogue
Review: Christopher Hunt went to Vietnam with the aim of traveling down the
Ho Chi Minh Trail and gather ideas for a novel. He wrote
a travelogue instead which details his adventures and the
people he meets. If you find yourself interested in Mr. Hunt's writing search for him on the Web. Some of his
fiction appears in ezines. Catherine Karnow did the cover
photography. Forty-one of her pictures from Vietnam appears
in the ezine @TLAS.
Issues such as the MIA's, the faith of the Amerasian and
the boat-people are addressed in passing. There are many
individual portraits of people from all over the country.
Rating: 
Summary: patronizing, shallow and contemptous acount
Review: Do not read this book if you want to discover the charm and beauty of Vietnam. Hunt's account of Vietnam and its people is shallow and supercilious.It appears that Hunt cannot accept the fact that his country lost the war. He might have spent sometime in Vietnam, but the experience has not taught him anything about appreciating the culture, sights and sounds of Vietnam.
Rating:
Summary: A horrendous experience for the author as well as the reader
Review: I was really disappointed by this book. The author missed all the charm of Vietnam. He was so intent on his own self indulgent, ethnocentric whining that he failed to see the richness of the culture surrounding him. My advice to him would be to lose the chip on his shoulder and to never travel overseas again.
Rating: 
Summary: Not as good as the competition
Review: If you want a book about two-wheel adventure in communist countries, far more enjoyable is "Mi Moto Fidel: Motorcycling Through Castro's Cuba," a fascinating and sometimes hilarious, sometimes hair-raising story of a 7,000-mile journey and justifiably the winner of both the 2002 "Travel Book of the Year" and the North American Travel Journalist Association's Awards of Excellence "Grand Prize."
Rating:
Summary: A Witty, Surprising Ride Through Vietnam
Review: While academics might look down on this witty work for merely touching on difficult questions, I found it the most useful preparation for a two week trip to Vietnam. Hunt gives poignant images of young people trying to survive in in a fast-changing country. They fantasize about the fabled suburbs of America - the land of infinite consumer goods, exciting movies, and Bay Watch. Yet the museums provide evidence of the long, brutal war known as "The American War."Hunt's Vietnam remains an odd, exotic country where anything can happen. How many places are there where police shake you down, negotiate a bribe, and then give you a receipt! I could relate to Hunt's twin desires to push the limits and explore the unknown while riding along the broken Ho Chi Minh trail - and being genuinely afraid. When does riding alone on a dark road become stupid? Can you trust the innkeeper? How can you transcend being the "rich" American in a poor country? What do people expect or want from you? What do you want from them? When are you being set up? Does evil lurk behind that smile? What topics, besides critizing Ho Chi Minh, are taboo? Where are the boundaries of speech in a corrupt police state? Is it fair for an American tourist to even comment on Vietnam's woes If you plan to see Hue, Saigon, Hanoi, or go to Laos, then this book presents awkward situations worth considering before visiting Southeast Asia. It's a travelogue, not an academic history of the area. Hunt critizes many aspects of Vietnam - he's judgemental. That also makes the book more real because I can't avoid, no matter how hard I might try, making judgements. You have to make choices, and Hunt shares his decision making process with us. I appreciated that! I looked at many, many books before my trip. I took Lonely Planet and the Rough Guide. This was the only book on Vietnam that I read cover to cover with delight.
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