I love a good travelogue as much as I do a historical novel. When I first visit a place, I personally find I don't do much reading about it before I go. I dislike having pre-conceptions about what I'm going to find. That said, I usually end up spending half a day in the English-language bookstores looking for books to read on the place once I'm there. This list should save you that trouble. By all means, read them before you go, but if you're like me, buy a few to take along to read once you've arrived in China.
1. Oracle Bones
Fascinating interwoven tales of everyday people that the author meets and knows in China with stories of China's archeological history. One of the most readable accounts of China today I've come across.Author: Peter Hessler
2. Wild Swans
If there's one historical book to read to gain an understanding of modern China, this is the one. This book is available only in an edited (censored) version in mainland China due to its frank discussion of the Cultural Revolution.Author: Jung Chang
3. Mr. China
The quintessential book on doing business in China. Anyone who is even thinking remotely about it should read Mr. China for the full scoop on how it is to do business with locals. It's a hilarious read, but should make you pause before you dive head-first into a business venture...while there are a billion customers there are at least as many headaches, or worse.Author: Tim Clissold
4. Shanghai: The Rise and Fall of a Decadent City
A well-told history of Shanghai. This book really takes you down the laneways and into the opium dens of Shanghai in the 1920s and 30s.Author: Stella Dong
5. Leaving Mother Lake: A Girlhood at the Edge of the World
While the author is a bit self-aggrandizing, this tale is an interesting one of China's minority cultures colliding with the modern day.Co-authors: Yang Erche Namu & Christine Mathieu
6. The Soong Dynasty
The tale of the Soong family, one of the most influential families on modern-day China. This book is also only available in edited (censored) English versions in mainland China due to its discussion of the struggle between the nationalist KMT under Chiang Kai-Shek and the communists led by Mao Zedong.Author: Sterling Seagrave
7. Riding the Iron Rooster: By Train Through China
Join Mr. Theroux on his train journey throughout China in the late 1980s. This is a great introduction to travel in the different areas of China, although things have certainly gotten a lot easier since Mr. Theroux's journey.Author: Paul Theroux
8. Fried Eggs with Chopsticks
A more recent travelogue than Riding the Iron Rooster, Evans travels by rail and bus to interesting parts of China. A sole woman traveler, it's a good read if you're thinking about backpacking or traveling on your own.Author: Polly Evans
9. The Chinese
A breakdown of the Chinese population by social, ethnic and economic lines, this book delves into the lives of everyday Chinese people.Author: Jasper Becker
10. Carl Crow, a Tough Old China Hand: The Life, Times, and Adventures of an America
Follow intrepid Crow from Missouri to Shanghai at the turn of the twentieth century and watch Shanghai change from a riverside village to the Paris of the East through his eyes.Mr. French is himself an old China hand and occasionally speaks about Carl Crow in Shanghai and abroad. Certainly try to catch one of his talks if you happen to be in town at the time.
Author: Paul French
11. Chasing the Monk's Shadow
With one foot in the seventh century following Xuanzang, a Chinese monk who traveled from China to India visiting Buddhist holy sites, and the other foot in the twenty-first finding herself along Xuanzang's footsteps, Saran's travelogue is a spellbinding journey between historical storytelling and day-by-day travel.Author: Mishi Saran
