What made you interested in reading The Lost Heart of Asia?
I read Colin Thubron’s Where Nights Are Longest this spring; I needed to read more.  His travel memoirs carry no touristy weight; his concern is to understand how the region’s culture is translated into lifestyle, art, architecture, literature and religion. 

Why do you like Colin Thubron? 
Thubron is particularly gifted at meeting people and making them comfortable sharing their thoughts and feelings.  A humble polyglot–I say humble because this fact is invisible in his writing–, Thubron can communicate with many different people groups in a native or near-to-native tongue.  He travels alone and strikes up conversations. People tell him compelling parts of their lives. 

So what, exactly, is the Lost Heart of Asia?
The five Central Asian republics: Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, and Kirghizstan.  These countries sit between Russia, China, India and Iran.  The book was written after their independence from the Soviet Union.  In short, the book explores the tensions between the two dominant ideologies, Communism and Islam, played out in this region. 

I’ve never even heard of some of those countries!   
In that sense it was a challenging book to read.  Nothing was familiar.  Uzbekistan’s capital, Tashkent, reminded me of Tashbaan in C.S. Lewis’ book The Horse and His Boy.  That was the extent of my familiarity!  The book has two good maps which I used often.  The other challenge was the vocabulary: Thubron used more than a dozen words I’ve never before seen.  (That is not a criticism; it makes me want to read more.)

There must have been something else that pulled you into this book…
If someone writes well, the unknown becomes interesting.  Listen to this:

Definitely.  Behind the Wall: A Journey Through China is on my shelf, in my queue.  In Siberia, Shadow of the Silk Road ,  Mirror to Damascus, and Journey into Cyprus all interest me.  I’ve only read one of Thubron’s novels, Falling, and didn’t care for it.  I think my next read should be Shadow of the Silk Road,  another trip through Central Asia, while some residual geography of the region remains with me.