Tibet, Tibet : A Personal History of a Lost Land

From the author of India: A Portrait, this book has been acclaimed as the work that showed the real Tibet for the first time.

Tibet has long fascinated the West, but what really lies beyond our romantic image of a Buddhist mountain kingdom of peace and spirituality? Travelling through the country, Patrick French meets warrior monks, nomads and a nun secretly fighting Chinese communist rule, but also young Tibetans with a more pragmatic attitude to their situation.

Interweaving these encounters with little-known stories of war and turmoil from Tibet's past, he reveals a more nuanced, fascinating and surprising picture of this complex place than any other book has done. As Pico Iyer wrote in the Los Angeles Times, this is work that is "inspired and heartfelt" and "shows that Tibet was never the peace-loving paradise so many generations of well-wishers have longed for it to be" – a gripping mix of history, travel writing and personal memoir that offers something greatly superior in its honesty and lack of false sentiment.