Each of these eminent authorities read a chapter of Romance on the Roadprior to publication and provided invaluable suggestions and expertise.

Southern Europe

• Dr. Eugenia Wickens, Buckinghamshire Chilterns University College in England, author of several journal articles on female hedonists in Greece
• Dr. Erik Cohen, Hebrew University in Jerusalem, perhaps the world’s most eminent researcher on the sociology of tourism

What’s Going On

Dr. Michael Bloor, Cardiff University in Wales, an expert on HIV-related risk behavior, who has conducted the only random survey of young sex travelers

Caribbean

• Suzanne Lafont, co-author of the landmark study “For Love and Money: Romance Tourism in Jamaica”
• Veteran Caribbean travel writer Marianne Ilaw

Reasons

• Identity loss: Dr. Laura Juliano, American University
• Identity loss and the search for healing and love: Dr. Bloor’s Cardiff University colleague Dr. Michelle Thomas
• Connoisseurship and fantasy fulfillment: Baltimore hairdresser Maya
• Man shortages and a revolution in mate selection: Dr. Scott J. South, the State University of New York-Albany, premier sociologist on family and marriage issues
• Involuntary celibacy: Dr. Denise A. Donnelly, Georgia State University
• Mate selection: Famed anthropologist of human sexuality Dr. Donald Symons of the University of California-Santa Barbara
• The dating war: Therapist Mary Ann Constantinides

Africa

Catharine Cooper, a former Peace Corps volunteer in Kenya, and Carr and Elizabeth Kizzier, former residents of Kenya, now respectively a Baltimore area teacher and a development officer with the Johns Hopkins international maternal health program

Experiences

• University of Michigan statistician Anamaria Kazanis (immigration data)
• Dr. Ron de Graaf, senior researcher at the Netherlands Institute of Mental Health and Addiction (types of sex travelers, and their HIV and mental health risks)
• Mary Ann Constantinides (mental health aspects)

Asia

Dr. Petri Hottola of the Finnish University Network for Tourism Studies and the University of Joensuu (India), author of a book touching on backpacker behavior in South Asia

History

• Dr. Maria Frawley of the University of Delaware, author of A Wider Range: Travel Writing by Women in the Victorian Era
• Jane Robinson, author of Unsuitable for Ladies: An Anthology of Women Travellers and Wayward Women (Victorian female travelers)
• Independent scholar Christopher Buyers (Indian maharajas), who maintains a comprehensive Web site, The Royal Ark: Royal and Ruling Houses of Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas

Latin America

Elizabeth K. Hilton, a former Peace Corps volunteer in Honduras now at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing in Baltimore, Md..

Middle East

Athena Kellner, a former English teacher in Syria.

Oceania

Hawaii-based Shereé Lipton, veteran traveler in the remote South Pacific and author of Fiji I Love You, Full Speed.

Portrayals

• Dr. Susan Blake of Lafayette College in Pennsylvania
• Dr. Jessica Rabin of Anne Arundel Community College in Maryland

Sex, Power, Ethics and the Future

• Mary Ann Constantinides
• Dr. Chris Ryan of the the University of Waikato in New Zealand, editor of Tourism Management and widely published on sex tourism and other aspects of travel