This book contains a collection of articles that include both case studies and theoretical insights applicable to the tourism development challenges of tropical coastal and island destinations throughout the world. Topics include the shortcomings of (eco)tourism in Madagascar, collaboration theory and successful multi-stakeholder partnerships on Indonesian resort islands, resilience theory and development pressures on a Malaysian island, results and implications of a detailed survey of cruise passengers in Colombia, perceptions of underdevelopment as limiting factors in Costa Rica, conflicts of perception and reality through the literary myths of Pitcairn Island, residents’ attitudes toward tourism in the Cape Verde Islands, and ‘slow tourism’ as a soft growth alternative to mass tourism development in the Lesser Antilles. As a collection, not only do the chapters provide readers a broad overview of the range of issues found in tropical coastal and island tourist destinations but they also offer tourism managers and planners insights into both the positive and negative aspects of alternative tourism development in tropical destinations.This book was published as a special issue of Tourism Geographies.