Yesterday Matt toured Laos and today we catch up with him some 5,000 air miles later in exotic Istanbul, Turkey. Discovering good reads set in Laos proved the more challenging. I did manage to come up with one great recommendation from the blog of Christopher Moore absurdest fiction writer of “Stupidest Angel”, “Fluke” and “You Suck”.

There is a small band of writers living in Thailand. Colin Cotterill is a writer whose writing has not appeared on the radar screen in Thailand. But it should. He maintains a website that, among other things, is seeking a way to distribute books to children in Laos.

Cotterill has broken into the New York publishing market with two mysteries (currently five) that have been receiving rave reviews. To suggest that New York publishers avoid fiction set in Southeast Asia is obviously incorrect. Good writing always finds a way to market.

“Curse of the Pogo Stick” (Soho Press 2008) is the fifth book in this crime fiction series set in Laos in 1975. It features seventy-three-year-old Dr. Siri Paiboun, national coroner of Laos. Definitely check this series out if you are a fan of the Alexander McCall Smith‘s books.

If Istanbul is your target, most famous are the books by Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk. Insiders tell me, however, that the one must read before visiting Turkey is “Birds Without Wings” by Louis De Bernieres author of “Corelli’s Mandolin: A Novel”. You choose. No one is a loser.