The mystery and magnificence of the Great Wall of China have fascinated historians and artists for centuries. In recent years, photographer Lindesay traveled the entire length of the wall to document its current state in comparison to earlier photographs and drawings. For this elegant, lavishly illustrated book, Lindesay selected 72 of the most striking comparisons, juxtaposing his new photographs with the older images to illustrate the "changes inflicted by man and nature."...Lindesay's album...provides a one-of-a-kind time-lapse view of the wall and a thoughtful lesson about the preservation of historical monuments.
   --Publishers Weekly (starred review)

In 1990, William Lindesay, a British authority on the Great Wall, Beijing, happened upon a copy of The Great Wall of China, a travelogue by William Edgar Geil--very likely the first individual, Chinese included--to traverse the entire Great Wall of China, at the turn of the century...Lindesay thumbed through the book, transfixed by the photographs, particularly one showing Geil near a tower on a remote section of the wall. Lindesay possessed his own photograph of that very site; however, by the time he arrived there in 1987, the tower visible in Geil's image had vanished...Beginning in 2004, he set out to locate and re-photograph the sites depicted in Geil's pictures...Lindesay's then-and-now images...document changes to the wall in the last century.
   --Smithsonian

The second-best instrument besides a ticket to see something in person is a good book. Or, in this case, a great book.
   --Catharine Hamm, Los Angeles Times

William Lindesay made a solo journey along the Great Wall on foot in 1987—nearly 2,500 km. Since settling in China in 1990, he founded International Friends of the Great Wall, an organization that cooperates on preservation projects with the Beijing Administration of Cultural Heritage and the World Monuments Fund. Lindesay is the author of Alone on the Great Wall and Images of Asia: The Great Wall. He was awarded the Friendship Medal from the Chinese Government and holds the rank of Officer, Order of the British Empire.