Backpacker

'Leaving the blinding sand for the cool shade of the trees, I walked carefully through the undergrowth to where Dave, using two twigs as chopsticks, was picking up a freshly severed human finger'... John's trip to India starts badly when his girlfriend returns home. Left to his own devices, he soon finds himself looking at the sharp end of a knife in a train station cubicle. But his life is saved - and turned upside down - by an enigmatic fellow traveller called Rick, who persuades John to question his mundane plans for the future, risking it all for much, much more. Fast forward to the Thai island of Koh Pha-Ngan; John, Rick and their new friend Dave pose as millionaire aristocrats in a hedonistic Eden of beautiful girls, free drugs and wild beach parties. However, when they find themselves hotly pursued by the Thai Mafia. Tragedy sends them on increasingly adrenalin-fuelled journeys to Indonesia, Australia and Hong Kong, facing danger at every turn. This is not travel writing for the faint-hearted: this is an unbelievable true story of the hunt for excess, at any cost. AUTHOR: At the age of 18, after a variety of dismal package holidays, John Harris bought a ticket to Egypt; things would never be the same again. Following a few years of on-off travel, mostly in Africa, he decided to go a stage further and work in the developing world, joining VSO to work as a building instructor in Nigeria. Back in London, life proved uninspiring and the draw of distant shores called again. John set off on his trip round South-East Asia which later formed the background for The Backpacker.