View to a different world
This little book is so easily read that I find myself picking it up and just opening any page - where I am transported to a different universe. The illustrations are delightful. The esoteric subjects of Arabic literature and history are opened up with fluid grace. Who would have thought that a travelogue through Yemen and other mysterious and closed cultures could be so interesting? I have given this book as a gift to friends I thought were astute enough to value it. Anyone who is curious about territories usually unexplored by travel writers will love this book.

Ibn Battutah couldn't have been this dull
I've spent some time in Tangier, where Ibn Battutah is still a well-known name after a lot of centuries, and was happy to see that someone had produced a new look in English on the subject. Regrettably, the focus of this effort is more on the author, Timothy Macintosh-Smith himself than on the intrepid traveler Ibn Battutah. I've no doubt that Mackintosh-Smith is a well-educated and experienced Arabist, but his writing style in this short book is not only stilted and pretentious, it's frequently closeminded and (to my mind) unfair to the alleged subject. There are occasional insights worth having here, but overall, this is not a book that I would recommend.

Tedious with Gratuitous Obscurity
I wanted to enjoy this book. The premise is interesting. The author is fascinated by Ibn Battutah and his travels. He sets off to follow in IB's footsteps. The author draws references from many bizarre sources presumably to help clarify or explain some of his experiences, but what it ends up being is gratuitous obscurity. I carefully sought out his references, but I did not feel rewarded. I noted with interest how often the author clarified that he was not married and did not wish to be and that he is not a Muslim and did not wish to be. These two issues arose many times. I was interested in the Eye of Joy and a couple of his jokes, but overall I felt the author was trying to impress the reader with his wide knowledge of obscurity rather than share an experience with his reader.

One of the best
Mr. Mackintosh-Smith can write!!
He is a stylist of the highest order. He combines this with a Quixote-like obsession with Ibn-Batuta and an erudite facility with Arabic. All this makes for a book that offers a personal, insightful and often very funny guide to regions of the world that could do with being better understood. He is neither an old-fashioned Orientalist nor an anti-Orientalist. At best one could perhaps describe him as a post-Saidian with a fondness for bowel movements.

Worth the effort
If you are interested in the genre of travel writing where it merges with history then this book is worth the effort that it takes to read it. It takes a chapter, or two, to get used to the style of writing. Unlike so many other books of this type the editor has permitted the author to keep the quirks of style that allow the reader to acknowledge the presence of the individual rather than the blandness found in so many other books. As a result you gain an insight into the worlds of the author and IB. The fact that Mackintosh-Smith speaks fluent Arabic gives a depth to the book that is rare in similar works.
I read this book slowly and with great interest. Having some knowledge of the history of the region does help but is not a prerequisite. The reader is taken on a slow journey into a region of the world that is all to often portrayed as bordering on permanent chaos. It is not a book for someone who wants to skim or is disinterested in the minutiae of traveling in the footsteps of a long gone traveler. The end result is a satisfying and enjoyable read.