Out of the Way but Not Out of This World : LOST WORLDS: Exploring the Earth’s Remote Places <i> by David Yeadon (HarperCollins, $27.50 hardcover).</i>

Writers drawn to out-of-the-way corners of the world rarely hie themselves there lightly. They pack their carry-ons with purpose--and, sorry Mr. Fodor, but they’re sure not looking for sunsets or room service when they arrive. In striding boldly across some inhospitable tract of desert or careening down some violent river in a handmade boat, they invariably discover not just themselves but some great humbling truth about the universe, or at least the planet--which they then share with their readers in a tone usually very earnest or rather arch.

David Yeadon, the author of numerous travel guides, covering secluded islands and New York bars alike, makes it clear that he travels at least partly for “inner exploration . “ But when he sets his observations down on paper, he is no pretentious instant philosopher. He’s a highly entertaining writer who fills his accounts of adventures in Zaire, Venezuela, Tasmania and elsewhere with humor, vivid description and a quality that might best be called good old-fashioned personality. The principal truths he divines seem to be that there’s a lot of wonderful stuff to be seen and done out there and that, wherever you go and however they dress (or don’t dress), people are mostly just people.

A YEAR IN LAPLAND: Guest of the Reindeer Herders by Hugh Beach (Smithsonian Institution Press, $24.95 hardcover).

Lapland is one remote place that David Yeadon doesn’t seem to have reached yet. Hugh Beach, an American anthropologist of Swedish descent, now teaching at Sweden’s Uppsala University, not only reached this far-northern region (which stretches across part of Russia, Finland, Sweden and Norway) but lived there for a year in his own goattieh or turf-covered house, and became part of the local community. With his Saami (as Lapps call themselves) hosts, he hunted, herded, fished, ate and drank, and made ready friends. His book has a certain anthropological dryness in parts, but comes to life sometimes, and adds up to a compelling portrait of a little-known but ancient European culture.

CANYONS OF THE SOUTHWEST: A Tour of the Great Canyon Country From Colorado to Northern Mexico, photographs and text by John Annerino (Sierra Club Books, $25 hardcover).

We call only one canyon “grand,” but John Annerino makes a pretty good case, in both pictures and words, for considering a good many of them throughout the southwestern United States and just across the Mexican border as “great.” Geologically venerable, resonant with human history, stunningly beautiful, these are certainly among our most imposing and seductive natural environments. Annerino’s paean to them is handsome and thoughtful.

Quick trips:

THE BEST OF ORANGE COUNTY CALIFORNIA: A Guide to Scenic, Recreational & Historical Attractions by Gregory Lee (Johnston Associates International, $12.95 paper). A brief but informative guide, featuring Friends of the Sea Lion Marine Mammal Center in Laguna Beach, the International Printing Museum in Buena Park and many other places you might not have known about--plus Disneyland and the Richard M. Nixon Library and Birthplace.

THE HISTORIC BLACK SOUTH by James Haskins and Joanne Biondi (Hippocrene, $14.95 paper). Museums, restored plantations, historical monuments, noteworthy churches, blues clubs, even barber shops and markets--all with potential significance to the black American traveler, and hence to justg about everybody else in this country as well.

STRANDED AT O’HARE by Kelly Warnken (The Book Factory, $9.95 paper; available by mail for $12.45 per copy from The Book Factory, P.O. Box 4430, Chicago, Ill. 60680-4430). Chilling title; quick notes on hotels, restaurants and other diversions near the airport; hope you never need it; hope you have it if you do.

Books to Go appears the second and fourth week of every month.