Mani - Travels in the Southern Peloponnese, by Patrick Leigh Fermor

A very good travel book; Patrick Leigh Fermor clearly loved Greece and he can convey his fascination with the country in the most enjoyable way. Reading his descriptions and his dilletantish digressions about its culture and history, one really wants to go there, and how more successful can a travel book get? It's very well written, even if not as good as A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water, which are his best books. It's very interesting to read about Greece under the Byzantine and the Ottoman Empires, and know about the continuity of its history from the Classical times until the 20th century.