Enthralling... He depicts a land of extraordinary physical beauty and interest and his prose is always elegant. Read this book for its human truthfulness and for unforgettable moments
Daily Telegraph
Red Dust is a tour de force, a powerfully picaresque cross between the sort of travel book any Western author would give his eye-teeth to write, and a disturbing confession
Independent
It opens windows on landscapes small and vast, all still largely unobserved and unknown to Westerners
Observer
Honest, raw, insightful... The Chinese equivalent of On the Road
Time
[Ma's] powers of description make every page buzz with life... Someone who could rank among the great travel writers
New York Times Book Review
His narrative is blessed with a prose style that compresses meaning as succinctly as Chinese calligraphy
The Times
Like a Chinese Jack Kerouac...his book is a riveting record of how he tried to make sense of his new experiences
Sunday Times
An unflinching account of a three-year journey by an insider who feels like an outsider in his native China
Chris Moss
Sunday Telegraph
A Sino-beatnik travelogue, [and] a fascinating search for self
Mother Jones
Ma captures the feel of wandering off China's beaten track, which is to say most of the country, far from the tour buses and souvenir stands
Los Angeles Times