It took me a long time to go through this book. I love travelling books and memoirs, and I definitely like to read about India, so I was very excited to start reading this book. However I was a little disappointed because for some reason I could not engage with this narrative. To me all the anecdotes and episodes had no palpable connection, and I sometimes lost track of where geographically we were, and even the time scale was not clear to me.

It could have been me, but it did not manage to retain my attention for long.

George Black has given us a travelogue/memoir of India which outlines in fascinating detail and subtext the incredible facts and mysteries of this hugely complex country. I have travelled quite a lot of the world but have always felt somewhat intimidated by India. It is such a complex and nuanced country and, of course, the media coverage of assaults on women receives tremendous media coverage. So this book fascinates me. Perhaps I will visit - it certainly sounds fascinating. I highly recommend this book for any travellers or arm-chair travellers or indeed for anyone interested in the wider world. Well-written and a great read.
My thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an arc in exchange for my honest review.

‘You have to understand,’ a friend had told me once, only half-joking. ‘In India, there are no facts.’

George Black's On the Ganges is a sweeping travelogue that both reflects on the genre itself in Indian history as well as furthers the writing style with decisive insight into contemporary issues in the country. The author looks to answer several key questions but ultimately: Why have people travelled to India and what have they found? Organized roughly by geography, from the Himalayas to the Bay of Bengal, the book follows the path of the river, and the footsteps of the early chroniclers of the land and its culture. 

Black doesn't discriminate in his reportage. He documents adventure travel, historical tracks, and spiritual awakenings. From Twain to Ginsberg to The Beatles, there's a purpose and a discovery behind every departure into the subcontinent. Black gives us the medicinal (cow urine soda), the artistic (Dear Prudence), the economic (cremation graft), the ecology (tannery pollution), and the cultural (mustache world records!). This list doesn't even start to scratch the surface of his related findings. 

The book is written in short chapters that follow the traveler through the many hamlets, villages, and metropolises. Some are connected in topic, some are not, but they are all easily digestible. The writing is filled with smart allusions and funny quips, and I particularly enjoyed the times when Black wrote in the first person. Granted, there is a difficult balance that has to be struck between the writer and the subject, yet at times I wanted a little more of the story of his journey, and less of the history and background information. 

For me, a good travelogue is one that allows the reader to escape to another place with an experienced tour guide, one who provides a little history, perspective, and cultural nuance. On the Ganges does just that. I enjoyed traveling with Black for a bit and learning about a part of the world that I have been somewhat unschooled in until now. 

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and George Black for an advanced copy for review.

I loved this book. It’s tremendously researched and entertaining. Having just returned from India, I am thrilled to return again after reading this book. Bravo Mr, Black!

I have been fascinated by India since I was a child, when my father told me stories about the India he visited. He absolutely hated the place and jumped ship (he was in the British Navy), rather than return there. Any place that aroused so much emotion, must surely be fascinating, and that’s how my lifelong interest in India began. Every time I have planned to go, something has prevented me from leaving (9/11, a deathly ill child), so I have had to content myself with armchair traveling. I loved this book, Black had many of the same things to say about the Ganges that my father did, it was filthy, polluted, had dead bodies floating in it. But Black also portrays the mystical quality of the river, the reverence in which its held by so many people. It’s a contradiction for sure, just like India itself.