Named Ilha Formosa - 'beautiful island' - by Portuguese sailors in the sixteenth century, Taiwan has been desired by the world's imperial powers ever since. Today, despite Taiwan's indigenous population claiming that their ancestry goes back millennia, the People's Republic of China claims the island is - and always has been - Chinese territory and threatens to invade, making it one of the world's most volatile flashpoints. Yet few of us know much about the rich history of this long-coveted country.

In Beautiful Island, China specialist and historian Grace Jackson winds her way through Taiwan's cities and villages following in the footsteps of John Thomson, the pioneer of travel photography who undertook a journey to Taiwan in the 1870s. Thomson - an Edinburgh-born son of a tobacconist who worked his way into the elite Royal Geographical Society, and produced the only existing images of Taiwan at this time - occupies a fascinating, complex role in the island's story. In some ways he is the archetypal Victorian, documenting, categorising the people he meets; and yet he is regarded as a hero by some in Taiwan, as his photographs of the indigenous communities are used as evidence today of Taiwan's right to independence.

In the vein of Olivia Laing, Sophy Roberts and Anna Sherman, Grace Jackson combines history, travel writing and memoir to create a completely transporting and illuminating journey into this beautiful island. This is a book about Taiwan, but also about the legacy of colonialism (British, Dutch, Japanese amongst others), about the troubled history of anthropology, and about a country's right to exist on its own terms.