All reviews and features are listed in full chronologically below the 'Select Review Quotes'. For individual reviews click on a quote or a media listing on the right.

Select Review Quotes

  • ‘This is the book I wish I’d had when I first came to Thailand.’
    — Alex Kerr, author of ‘Lost Japan’
  • ‘A unique guide to Thai pop and folk culture. Future social historians will thank Cornwel-Smith.’
    — Andrew Marshall, Time magazine
  • ‘An entertaining and provocative look at Thai culture.’
    — John Burdett, author of Bangkok 8
  • ‘Philip Cornwel-Smith is writing in a way that I like, with an electric eye for the streets.’
    — Lawrence Osborne, author of ‘Bangkok Days’
  • ‘A thrilling, trail-blazing book of cultural history… A work of astounding breadth and erudition. Very Thai has few, if any, English-language equals.’
    — Nick Grossman, Bangkok Post
  • ‘A more sophisticated guide to the country’s contemporary culture’
    – Conde Nast Traveller
  • ‘A brilliant book-length photo-essay… Cornwel-Smith writes with astute animation.’
    — Donald Richie, Top 3 Books on Asia 2005, Japan Times
  • ‘Required reading for visitors, residents and anyone anywhere interested in what makes Thailand tick.’
    — Jennifer Gampell, Asian Wall Street Journal
  • ‘With a wit that suits the Thai spirit, Very Thai explains with delicateness things that Thais regard as indelicate. An important source that reflects modern Thai consciousness.”
    — Pracha Suweeranont, Matichon Weekly
  • ‘It was about time that somebody wrote something worth reading about the Thai culture. Philip Cornwel-Smith does that, and does it well. Read Very Thai. You’ll be glad you did.
    — Bertil Lintner, The Irrawaddy
  • ‘It is truly so much better than any other “guide”.’
    — Paul Dorsey, The Nation
  • ‘Very Thai is the first in-depth examination of Thai popular culture.’
    — Jason Gagliardi, South China Morning Post
  • ‘Answers and insights aplenty in this erudite, sumptuously photographed guide to contemporary Thai culture.’
    — Lucy Ridout, Rough Guide to Thailand
  • ‘Very Thai shines a loving light on the minutiae of everyday life. The book is equally fun and authoritative.’
    — Andrew Marshall, The Australian
  • ‘Pick of the Picture Books. Very Thai is an attempt to capture the complex realities of Thai culture, a blend of finesse and fun which fuses folk tradition with hi-tech and bling. Here are fascinating glimpses of high life, low life, street life and, er, Honda life.”
    — The Independent newspaper (UK)
  • ‘The publishing sensation of 2004. This book is a revelation of all those things we thought we’d never understand.’
    — Vaudine England, Dateline, Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand
  • ‘A delightful read and a wonderful roadmap to diverse elements of Thai Popular Culture.’
    — Gerald W Fry, Historical Dictionary of Thailand
  • ‘No other author has delved so deeply into the subconscious of Thai popular culture in such an intriguing, eye-opening way. You’ll love the insights gained from reading this best-seller. Wonderful photography too!’
    — Nancy Chandler Map of Bangkok

Reviews in Full

October 31, 2006

AFP (feature)

Thai tuk-tuks go global

by Charlotte McDonald-Gibson

http://travel.iafrica.com/bulletinboard/349052.htm

London has its black cabs, Venice its gondolas, and Bangkok its tuk-tuks, but Thailand’s iconic three-wheeled taxis are going global as foreigners scramble to pick up a piece of Thai culture.

The smoke-belching motorised rickshaws can now be seen plying Britain’s seaside towns, Canada’s golf courses and Tokyo’s neon-lit streets, and manufacturers have seen a surge in global sales and recognition.

“Japan they have Toyota, they have Nissan, so Thailand has a car also — a tuk-tuk,” says Anuwat Yuteeraprapa, owner of Expertise, a tuk-tuk manufacturer which exports 95 percent of its vehicles abroad. read more »

Posted in: Reviews
August 31, 2006

Bangkok Recorder

Recorder Read: ‘Very Thai – Everyday Popular Culture’

by Laurie Osborne

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Bangkokrecorder Urban Magazine VT sml

Forget Lonely Planet, Very Thai – Everyday Popular Culture takes readers on a far more in-depth foray into Thai culture, one you won’t see on the Tourism Authority of Thailand’s website.

This Technicolored book is packed with explanations of modern-day phenomena, ranging from the everyday to the cosmic. For foreigners, it answers a thousand puzzling curiosities, from why tangled webs of electrical wire are proudly displayed as symbols of modernity to how whisky tables reinforce social hierarchy. Thai people themselves seem to have a more bemused attitude to Very Thai, delighted that such recognizable objects are the subject of a best-seller.

Before casting cynicism over the English author of a book called Very Thai, consider the detached and non-judgmental approach the writer, Philip Cornwel-Smith, has adopted in presenting popular Thai culture. Sometimes it takes an outsider to see value in the simple things. 

What better perspective than a 12-year resident of Bangkok and founding editor of Metro magazine? We sat down with the British-born Philip to discuss sex, tattoos and rock ‘n roll… 

 read more »

Posted in: Reviews
April 14, 2006

AFP (interview)

Thai water festival washes away political turmoil

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/thailandpolitics
BANGKOK (AFP) – A little more than a week ago, Bangkok was at a standstill caused by daily political rallies. But judging by the crowds snaking through the Thai capital during the Songkran water festival, nothing could now be further from most people’s minds.
Bangkok seems to have effortlessly shifted gear from the political protests that forced out Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra into celebratory mood, with tens of thousands of people armed with water pistols taking to the streets for this year’s festival.
Songkran, which commemorates the Buddhist New Year, is traditionally a time of renewal and involves pouring water over shrines and other people as a sign of cleansing.
But recently the festival has become a free-for-all water fight, when total strangers douse each other with water and spread white paste on their faces. For three days in Bangkok, people take to the streets armed with water pistols. read more »

Posted in: Reviews
March 1, 2006

Conde Nast Traveller

Thai High

Bouncing back post-tsunami, Thailand is on a roll, with a booming economy, a flourishing arts scene, and an efficiently cosmopolitan capital. Giddy from cleaner air and new transport, Jamie James gets a contact high from Bangkok’s worldly buzz

By Jamie James

Thai High _ Condé Nast Traveler 1 Thai High _ Condé Nast Traveler 2

http://www.concierge.com/cntraveler/articles/detail?articleId=10233&pageNumber=1

Razzle-dazzle: At Sirocco, dine alfresco on the sixty-third floor of Bangkok’s second-tallest building, the State Tower, where Mediterranean cuisine and live jazz compete with glittering city views
Bangkok is one of the most heterogeneous, if not miscellaneous, cities in the world. Wandering down Sukhumvit Road, a main thoroughfare, in one block I passed a Kashmiri restaurant, a camping-gear shop, a diamond merchant, and a passel of friendly girls in red high heels in front of Pedro’s Bar before arriving at my destination, the California Wow Xperience, a popular exercise club. At the entrance, speakers aimed at the street keened and thudded with techno music. Directly underneath, two old women sat on camp stools, peddling lottery tickets and Buddhist amulets, while behind them a little girl sprawled on the sidewalk doing her English homework under a banner advertising a two-for-one membership promotion. read more »

Posted in: Reviews