The problem with being a book snob— and, yes, we admit we qualify—is that style matters. Form matters. Cadence matters. Content, yes, but only if the writer knows how to write. In Cecilie Gamst Berg’s travel book, Don’t Joke on the Stairs, all of that is thrown out the window in favor of a rambling series of admittedly interesting travel stories from her numerous trips throughout the Chinese mainland. A Hong Kong permanent resident, Gamst is fluent in Mandarin and has more China experience than most travel writers. Unafraid of local trains and always on the lookout for affordable hotels, Gamst finds herself stranded in post-riot Xinjiang, traipsing through the countryside of Tibet, playing mahjong with the locals and lusting after Chinese men. Gamst writes the way one imagines she talks, in fits and starts, in enthusiastic expressions and run-on sentences, in paragraphs whose order defies logical progression. While painful to read, it does give the impression that Gamst would be a riot to have drinks with. If we were on a hard seat to Gansu, we’d want her on the train with us.

Cecilie Gamst Berg, Don’t Joke on the Stairs: How I Learnt to Navigate China by Breaking Most of the Rules, Blacksmith Books, $16.95