Announcing my new book: Trials & Tea Ceremonies: Misadventures in Far Away Places.

A hilarious and heartfelt journey for anyone who has ever wondered: “Is this it?”

What happens when the life you’ve built no longer feels like your own?

For Basho, turning thirty felt less like a milestone and more like “a splinter in the mind.” A series of personal crises convinced him and his partner, Cesca, to make a radical choice. They walked away from their careers, put their lives in storage, and set off on a year-long, unscripted adventure across a dozen countries to answer one question: Is there a better way to live?

Their path takes them from the rugged shores of Australia to the spiritual heart of India and the serene temples of Japan. But between the moments of transcendent beauty, a deeper, wilder journey unfolds. They must face down spitting alpacas, chaotic farm hosts, a terrifying encounter with the world’s largest spider in a Laotian toilet, and the constant challenge of escaping the “backpacker bubble” to find genuine connection.

With relentless honesty and dry wit, Trials & Tea Ceremonies charts a quest to stop living life as a pilgrimage toward a distant reward and instead learn to dance to the music while it’s playing. It’s a profound and unflinchingly funny memoir about leaving everything behind to find what truly matters—together.

Perfect for fans of Bill Bryson, Elizabeth Gilbert, and Cheryl Strayed, this is more than a travelogue—it’s an invitation to question the path you’re on and a roadmap for finding your way back to yourself.

I was incredibly fortunate to receive some early feedback from the celebrated author Pico Iyer, who so generously shared his thoughts: