Note: Read to the end for your chance at a fabulous prize!

Maybe it’s because I’m female. Or maybe it’s because I’m a prude, or, who knows what it is, but I always find it troubling when sex tourism gets treated more with irony than outrage. Gonzo travel guys seem to visit these places and merely raise an ironic eyebrow over their tourist priced beer while not being particularly bothered one way or the other about the fate of underaged prostitutes or women who make money by writing banners with markers stuffed in … oh, you get it. It disappoints me when these otherwise funny, smart, insightful, (many positive adjectives here) seem to give sex tourism a get out of scrutiny free card. I have to read the sections in question in “Smile When You’re Lying” again to confirm this is correct and that I’ve not put the book down with a false impression.

That’s all I’ve got by way of criticism about Chuck Thompson’s hilarious, painful, scathing, and again hilarious book. It was especially excruciating to read it following our press junket. We both indulged in and were victims of all the things Thompson takes down in his book – the freebies, the PR rep hosted cocktail hours, the nonexistent support for our trip from the publisher, and still, I sit at my desk every day involved in the terrible evil of writing noncritical prose about our destination. Forgive me, Thompson, for I have sinned, and am surrounded by sinners.

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