The Dark Tourist by Dom Joly
'Dark tourism is the act of travel and visitation to sites, attractions and exhibitions which have real or recreated death, suffering or the seemingly macabre as a main theme' Ever since he can remember, Dom Joly has been fascinated by travel to odd places. In part this stems from a childhood spent in war-torn Lebanon, where instead of swapping marbles in the schoolyard, he had a shrapnel collection -- the schoolboy currency of Beirut. Dom's upbringing was interspersed with terrifying days and nights spent hunkered in the family basement under Syrian rocket attack or coming across a pile of severed heads from a sectarian execution in the pine forests near his home. These early experiences left Dom with a profound loathing for the sanitized experiences of the modern day travel industry and a taste for the darkest of places. And in this brilliantly odd and hilariously told travel memoir, Dom Joly sets out on a quest to visit those destinations from which the average tourist would, and should, run a mile. The more insalubrious the place, the more interesting is the journey and so we follow Dom as he skis in Iran on segregated slopes, spends a weekend in Chernobyl, tours the assassination sites of America and becomes one of the few Westerners to be granted entry into North Korea. Eventually Dom journeys back to his roots in Beirut only to discover he was at school with Osama Bin Laden. Funny and frightening in equal measure, this is a uniquely bizarre and compelling travelogue from one of the most fearless and innovative comedians around.
Dom Joly is a British television comedian and journalist. He is the star of Trigger Happy TV, a hidden camera show that was sold to over seventy countries worldwide as well as World Shut Your Mouth for BBC1 and Dom Joly's Happy Hour, a spoof travel show for Sky One.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781847376954 |
| ISBN 10 | 1847376959 |
| Title | The Dark Tourist |
| Author | Dom Joly |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Simon & Schuster Ltd |
| Year published | 2010-09-02 |
| Number of pages | 288 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |