I came across Paul Theroux’s The Happy Isles of Oceania purely by chance, but I’m glad I did. So far, I’m about the a third of the way through the the book and the miserable Theroux has paddled his collapsible kayak through Meganesia and Melanesia on his way to Polynesia while giving the reader a detailed, although usually less-than-flattering, portrait of the inhabitants of these islands. It’s a fun and fast read and I recommend it to anyone.
