Tom Miller interview at RolfPotts.com

This month at RolfPotts.com, I interview journalist Tom Miller, whose travel books include Jack Ruby’s Kitchen Sink, The Panama Hat Trail, and Trading with the Enemy. Miller tells me he avoids referring to himself as a "travel writer" (he considers this pretentious), and points out that "you can find 'travel writing' -- whatever that is -- in a good book on economics, in a book about dance or sports or theater or agrarian dilemmas of Central Asia. It's these unexpected finds that appeal most to me."

On the road, Miller suggests that writers forgo a dependence on technological gadgets. "I keep electronic paraphernalia to an absolute minimum," he says. "No camera, no recording device, no laptop, none of this palm pilot nonsense or a cell phone. Paper and pencil, a book, maybe a bilingual dictionary. Anything beyond that (a) can be stolen, and (b) intimidates people you encounter. The more double-A batteries you carry, the more you distance yourself from the people you're writing about."

The full interview with Miller can be found here.