"In a text that is part travel memoir and part social commentary, Bonnett presents examples from around the world to illustrate humanity’s long-held fascination and infatuation with islands. The cases highlighted depict how civilizations throughout history have used islands as a means of escape, as tools to isolate and hide undesirable persons or secrets, as foundations for realizing economic, military, or political opportunity, as venues to accommodate population growth, or as symbols of religious devotion and piety. In particular, he notes the extent to which people have taken to creating artificial islands where none exist, modifying natural islands deemed inadequate for the proposed uses, or using artificial islands accidentally created by other activities. . . . Attractively illustrated with color photograph plates and hand-drawn maps and compiled during a two-year trek around the globe, the text is engaging and accessible to general audiences."

Choice

“A fascinating and intelligent book. . . . Bonnett writes with an acerbic charm.”

The Sunday Times (UK)

"Bonnett has written a most readable and sympathetic account of the various guises islands can take around the world and rightly points out the ecological consequences of human building projects."

Literary Review

"A great primer on the concept of islands in the modern age. . . . Engagingly written".

Library Journal

"[A] beguiling, fact-filled account of the world’s headlong dash to build artificial islands. Via a mixture of extensive desk research and short field visits, Bonnett invites readers to journey with him from military-orientated 'Frankenstein Islands' in the South China Sea to gigantic windfarms anchored to the bottom of the North Sea."

Times Literary Supplement

"Elsewhere: A Journey into Our Age of Islands is captivating, a delightful armchair travelogue [ . . . ] A prolific writer of academic adventure geography, Bonnett yet again shares his rare gift of successfully crafting intriguing geographical works that interest academics and the public alike."

Journal of Geography

“Elsewhere contributes to our understanding of the contemporary era of human civilization. Using the lens of islands—which have always provoked human attention and emotion—allows Bonnet to explore the psychology, politics, culture, and economics of the Anthropocene in a way that is both enjoyable and insightful.”

H-Net

“In Elsewhere, Bonnett combines a deep knowledge of history and contemporary geopolitics with a seasoned travel writer’s eye for the telling detail, as he gives us a tour of our terrifying but often beautiful new world.”

Joshua Keating, author of Invisible Countries

“An ambitious journey by wing, sail, rubber and road to find the lost, emerging, off-limits and artificial islands of our fast-changing world. Once again, Bonnett respectfully drags geography back to its roots.”

Bradley Garrett, author of Bunker: Building for the End Times

“Bonnett’s reporting of islands new and ancient—from trash islands to military islands to new environment-trashing ‘ultrastar’ islands to approaching-extinction islands—is a well-researched and open-handed cautionary tale for our times.”

Dan Boothby, author of Island of Dreams: A Personal History of a Remarkable Place

“Sheer vulnerability and bold architecture live cheek by jowl in this book. If islands did not exist, we would have to invent them. And now we do. Elsewhere helps us understand how and why.”

Godfrey Baldacchino, University of Malta; president of the International Small Islands Studies Association