These are the books I’ve read on my trip so far:
1) “One Night at the Call Centre” by Chetan Bhagat: novel, 2005. Indian author; 6 people working at a call center in India for an American company – an Indian perspective on the U.S. Funny, intelligent, serious! – I LOVED THE BOOK!
2) “Selige Witwen” by Ingrid Noll: novel, 2001. Two female friends getting rid of their friends’ horrible husbands. Ok, but not great.
3) “First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers” by Loung Ung: nonfiction, 2000. The author was five years old living in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, with her parents and 6 siblings when the Khmer Rouge took over in 1975. In the book she recalls her years in Cambodia under the Pol Pot Regime, first forced to leave the city, then to live in the countryside, how her father was taken away and probably killed, living at a work camp, etc. Eventually, she makes it to a refugee camp in Thailand and from there to the U.S. - The book is excellent, but her experiences horrible. EVERYBODY READ IT!!!
4) “The Tender Bar” by J.R. Moehringer: memoir, 2005. Author from Manhasset, a suburb of New York. He describes his childhood there and growing up in one of the bars, his years at Yale, working at the New York Times as an intern, etc. – still attached to the bar. It is an American story of self-invention and escape, the portrait of a boy’s struggle to become a man, suggesting that men remain, at heart, lost boys. - I really enjoyed reading this book (in German – I would have preferred to read it in English, though) as I could relate to it having lived in New York City for a couple of years. It also made me understand some of the men I met in NY…
5) “Ladyboys: The Secret World of Thailand’s Third Gender” by Susan Aldous & Pornchai Sereemongkonpol: nonfiction, 2008. This book contains 9 stories about the lives of 9 ladyboys living in Thailand. Ladyboys are sometimes referred to as Thailand’s third gender - biological men who have become women (various degrees of transformation). Although the stories cover the same topic, they are all different and the book is interesting, sad, and funny at the same time – overall a really good book to read!
6) “The Road of Lost Innocence: The True Story of a Cambodian Childhood” by Somaly Mam: memoir, 2008. The childhood and adult life of a Cambodian woman who managed to escape sexual slavery and then founded AFESIP to help combat the sexual trafficking of young girls and women. An amazing book!
Check out the website of the Somaly Mam Foundation: http://www.somaly.org/
7) “Sex Slaves: The Trafficking of Women in Asia” by Louise Brown: nonfiction, 2000. This is a very interesting, but also very sad book. It is more like a research paper, very factual. At times overwhelming. But very informative. I definitely recommend it to anyone interested in this topic!
— At this point I needed to read something lighter:
8) ”Merde Happens” by Stephen Clarke: novel, 2007. I read this book while traveling in New Zealand and it made me laugh A LOT 
It’s about a guy from Britain, who lives in France, his French girlfriend, and an American friend, who also lives in France, traveling through the U.S. together – more or less. The British guy is working for the British tourism agency trying to promote Britain in a competition of various countries in the States. Having lived in England and the US, as well as having traveled in France, this book was HILARIOUS to read
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