Until 1893, Mary Kingsley lived the typical life of a single Victorian woman, tending to sick relatives and keeping house for her brother. However, on the death of her parents, she undertook an extraordinary decision: with no prior knowledge of the region, she set out alone to West Africa to pursue her anthropological interests.

In 1878, Robert Louis Stevenson was suffering from poor health, struggling to survive on the income derived from his writings, and tormented by his infatuation with Fanny Osbourne, a married American woman. His response was to embark on journeys through Cevennes and America where he wrote 'Travels With a Donkey' and 'The Amateur Emigrant'.

Lady Wortley Montagu (1689-1762) was described by a contemporary, as 'one of the most extraordary shining characters in the world...'. Her newly edited letters tell of her travels through Europe to Turkey in 1716.

Lynne Hjelmgaard's The Turpentine Tree offers portraits of family, friends and relationships - of Hjelmgaard's uprooted life, including a life at sea, subsequent displacement, widowhood and search for connections.

The way of life of Iran's Bakhtiari, a people claiming descent from Fereydun, hero of the Shahnameh, has now all but disappeared, the result of persecution by Reza Shah and the encroachments and temptations of modernity. This book describes their everyday life.