While nursing a broken heart at the age of 25, Jessica Mudditt sets off from Melbourne for a year of solo backpacking through Asia.
She has spent six years at university, yet still has no idea what she is going to do with the rest of her life. She just knows that she is profoundly curious about other cultures and hungry for new experiences.
Her willingness to try almost anything quickly lands her in a scrape in Cambodia. With the nation's tragic history continuing to play out in the form of widespread poverty, Jessica looks for ways to make a positive impact.
She crosses overland into a remote part of Laos, where friendships form fast and jungle adventures await. Vietnam is an intoxicating sensory overload, and the hedonism of the backpacking scene reaches new heights. Jessica is awed by the scale and beauty of China, but she has underestimated the language barrier and begins her time there feeling lost and lonely.
In circumstances that take her by surprise, Jessica finds herself hiking to Mount Everest base camp in Tibet.
Travel, Travel in Asia
About The Author
Jessica Mudditt is the author of two memoirs and the founder of Hembury Books. Her first book is called Our Home in Myanmar and it was published in 2021. Her second book is Once Around the Sun - From Cambodia to Tibet. It's a two-part series, with Kathmandu to the Khyber Pass coming in 2025.
Hembury Books provides nonfiction authors with coaching, editing and self-publishing services. Jessica is a former journalist whose articles have been published by Forbes, BBC, GQ and Marie Claire, among others. She spent ten years working as a journalist in London, Bangladesh and Myanmar, before returning home in 2016. She lives in Sydney with her two daughters and two cats.
