The author writes, 'This is the workbook I needed before I left on my volunteer vacation." It will lead you step by step through issues to consider as you map out your trip. You'll learn how to: (1) Find the agency right for you (2) Record expenses for possible tax deductions (3) Organize your vaccination schedule (4) Pack lightly and efficiently (5) Make last minute checklists (6) Track your purchases for ease at customs (7) Organize your 'to do list' for when you return and a whole lot more. This workbook has a great reading list plus online resources to use before you travel as well as on the road.

Author: Jane Stanfield

Publisher: Where is She Heading

Website: www.whereissheheading.com

ISBN: 978 0 9821282 0 6

Juicy Tip From Book: Hold on to your receipts. What looks like a non-descript receipt that you received at immigration may actually be your temporary tourist visa. Keep any form or stamped receipt that you receive at immigration in your passport at all times while in the country.

Going through a break-up? Stressed out? Looking for inspiration or romance? Hoping to reinvent yourself or give back? Emmy award-winning travel writer highlights more than 100 vacation options, complete with chapter specific quizzes and insights from therapists and other travelers to help you pick the right trip. Travel Therapy is a timeless roadmap to self-discovery, happiness, and success that you can turn to for guidance and support for years to come.

Author: Karen Schaler

Publisher: Seal Press

Website: www.sealpress.com

ISBN: 978 1 58005 269 6

Juicy Tip From Book: "Going to a new place breaks you out of your rut and forces you to use new parts of your brain. It makes it easier to interrupt old, bad, ingrained patterns. If you're in a stuck spot in your life, go alone to someplace you've never been. You will meet the 'new you' there.' (Jane Fendelman, Counsellor, Phoenix, USA)

My yoga teacher wrote this book. She's a very cool lady. I think the concept of this book is very cool as well. Kitchen Yoga is a revolutionary off-the-mat yoga regime for people who can't always attend class. The 24 fully illustrated, easy to follow yoga poses are designed for young people and older adults, alike; for the retired and the active; for experienced yogis and tentative beginners. As the author explains, 'With Kitchen Yoga you can increase flexibility, mobility and strength by taking advantage of spare moments in the one place we spend time in daily -- the kitchen. And for travelers on the go, you can use the 24 Kitchen Yoga Travel Cards profiling the Kitchen Yoga poses. P.S. We like the fact that each pose comes with medical alerts -- i.e. don't practice this pose if you have certain rotator cuff conditions, etc.

Author: Ruth Shaw

Publisher: Ruth Shaw

Website: www.ruthshawyoga.com

ISBN: 978 0 9819869 0 3

Juicy Tip From Book: Practice forgiveness. Let go of the past. You can't change it, so release your emotional baggage, and if you need to have a good cry. Welcome the tears. Tears are your allies and your safety valve. There's nothing like a good cry to make you feel better and bring you back into the present moment. For my money, tears are the fountain of youth, they open the heart, release facial tension, and help to peel back the years.

DK Eyewitness Travel Japan is the guide that the Cruise West line recommends to accompany their spectacular cruises around Japan. This book bills itself as 'the guide that shows you what others only tell you' and it delivers. Oh my goodness, the collection of lovely photographs are both informative and enticing. From sections on Tea Ceremonies to the history of the island of Hokkaido to what to expect in Japanese food halls, DK Eyewitness Travel Japan carefully prepares you for a culture and history very different from your own. The maps provided have been improved over earlier editions (even includes a Tokyo subway system map) and there are more hotels and restaurants included this time. This is a very classy publication!

ISBN: 978 0 7566 2876 5

Website: http://traveldk.com/

Juicy Tip From Book: Official statistics for sexual assaults in Japan are very low, and any unwanted propositions from men can usually be shaken off with a simple no. However, groping hands on crowded trains are acknowledged to be a problem, and increasing evidence suggests that sex crimes tend to go unreported or unprosecuted in Japan. Thus, women are best advised to take due care everywhere they go and with whom they associate.

No entertainment is so cheap as reading,
nor any pleasures so lasting.
(Lady Montagu, 1753)

Children are made readers
on the laps of their parents.
(Emilie Buchwald, 1994)

The greatest gift is the passion for reading.
It is cheap, it consoles, it distracts, it excites, it gives you
knowledge of the world and experience of a wide kind.
It is moral illumination.
(Elizabeth Hardwick, 1989)

Exciting literature after supper
is not the best digestive.
(Charlotte Gilman, 1935)

I pity those who
have no taste for reading.
(Marie de Rabutin-Chantal, 1689)

When I only begin to read, I forget I'm on this
world. It lifts me on wings with high thoughts.
(Anzia Yezierska, 1920)

She read Dickens in the spirit in which she
would have eloped with him.
(Eudora Welty, 1984)