Bill Aitken Nanda Devi Affair (Penguin). Slow but deeply personal account of the author's long-standing love of the Indian Himalayas and his constant ambition to climb the elusive Nanda Devi peak.
" William Dalrymple City of Djinns (Flamingo). Dalrymple's award-winning account of a year in Delhi sifts through successive layers of the city's past. Each is vividly brought to life with a blend of inspired historical sleuth work and encounters with living vestiges of different eras: Urdu calligraphers, Sufi clerics, eunuchs, Persian-style pigeon fanciers and the last surviving descendant of the Moghul emperors. A real gem. His most recent book, The Age of Kali (published in India as In the Court of the Fish-Eyed Goddess ) is a collection of essays drawn from ten years' travel.
Trevor Fishlock Cobra Road (John Murray, UK). Former Times correspondent Fishlock's 1999 travelogue looks set to become a classic all-round introduction to the subcontinent. Sympathetic yet balanced, it looks at many of the ironies and absurdities inherent in modern India, whilst retaining a sense of humour and adventure.
" Alexander Frater Chasing the Monsoon (Penguin). Frater's wet-season jaunt up the west coast and across the Ganges plains took him through an India of muddy puddles and grey skies: an evocative account of the country as few visitors see it, and now something of a classic of the genre.
Jonathan Gregson Bullet Up The Grand Trunk Road (Sinclair-Stevenson). Former journalist's motorcycle journey from Calcutta to the northwest frontier, with comment on contemporary issues along the way.
Norman Lewis A Goddess in the Stones (Picador). Veteran English travel writer's typically idiosyncratic account of his trip to Calcutta and around the backwaters of Bihar and Orissa, with some vivid insights into tribal India.
Geoffrey Moorhouse Om (Sceptre). Not Moorhouse's strongest offering, but absorbing nevertheless. Following the death of his daughter, the author journeys round south India's key spiritual centres, providing typically well-informed asides on history, politics, contemporary culture and religion.
Dervla Murphy On a Shoestring to Coorg (Flamingo). Murphy stays with her young daughter in the little-visited tropical mountains of Coorg, Karnataka. Arguably the most famous modern Indian travelogue, and a manifesto for single-parent budget travel.
" Eric Newby Slowly down the Ganges (Picador). Newby has always regarded his mammoth journey from Haridwar to the mouth of the Hooghly as the most memorable of his many adventures. Though dated in places - it was written in the 1960s - his elegant prose and wry humour evoke the timeless allure of the subcontinent's holiest river.
" Tahir Shah Sorcerer's Apprentice (Weidenfeld & Nicolson). A journey through the weird underworld of occult India. Travelling as an apprentice to a master conjurer and illusionist, Shah encounters hangmen, baby renters, skeleton dealers, sadhus and charlatans.
" Mark Shand Travels on My Elephant (Penguin). Award-winning account of a 600-mile ride on an elephant from Konarak in Orissa to Bihar, accompanied by a drunken mahout, among others; full of incident, humour and pathos. For the sequel, Queen of the Elephants , Shand teams up with an Assamese princess who's the country's leading elephant handler.
Aglaja Stirn & Peter van Ham The Seven Sisters of India (Prestel). Definitive coffee-table book on northeastern India. Rich anthropological detail in the text is illustrated with superb photographs.
Heather Wood Third-Class Ticket (Penguin). A party of elderly Bengalis leave their home village for the first time to tour the subcontinent by train. Absorbing and poignant, though the ersatz fictional style grates after a while.
" Michael Wood The Smile of Murugan (Viking). An erudite and affectionate portrait of Tamil Nadu and its people in the mid-1990s, centred on a video-bus pilgrimage tour of the state's key sacred sites. One of the most enlightening books on south India ever written, though less interesting if you're not familiar with the region.
