Bill Bryson's book "Notes From A Big Country" is a series of informative comparisons between Britain and the USA of today. In every chapter (bite-sized essay) Bryson describes his experiences of everyday life on his return to America, having lived in Britain for twenty years. What attracted me to this book was the way the author expressed each occurrence in his rediscovery of America in a comical manner. I can honestly say that this is one of the funniest books I have read. Amongst these rambling jokes he manages, not only to describe incidents in great detail, but to make serious social comments about America too. This book was both amusing and educational and the use of the literary techniques makes this an extremely successful book about travel.

The difference between travel writing and a novel is that a travel book is open to scrutiny whereas a novel...