In 2005, American writer and editor Ken Budd's father collapsed and died after a heart attack.

After that shock, with his 40th birthday looming, Ken had a few questions about his own life that suddenly seemed more urgently in need of answers. Over the next couple of years, he traveled the world, volunteering with a wide range of organizations, and wrote a book that covers his adventures as a ‘voluntourist' in six countries, travels he made with and without his wife Julie, in pursuit of the answer to the question, “What am I doing that matters?”