Africa Books

Stanford University graduate and experienced businessman Moget Africa presents Moolah or Bummer! A Humorous Look at Finance and Investing, an amusing fusion of basic finance information and humor, in the forms of brief free- verse poems, each of which teaches the reader about a specific aspect of stock market and related interests. Each poem is only a page or two long, succinctly defining a given term for lay readers as well as its implications for someone looking to make Moolah and avoid a Bummer. Arranged in alphabetical order by subject, the poems combine to give a refreshing and easy-to-remember introduction to the perils and pitfalls of investing before risking hard-earned dollars. "P/E Ratio: Price/Earnings Ratio": It's a corporation's current stock price / divided by its EPS (earnings per share) / for the past twelve months. / A higher P/E ratio / means investors have higher expectations / for future growth.

Informative as well as very entertaining book on investing and finance. Perfect for young adults, college students and other financial novices first starting out on the road to investing and personal finance.

With no background or education in finance, I was pleased to read a book which explained many investment terms and scenarios in a humorous and yet understandable way. An easy and enjoyable read about a subject which could be dry and overwhelming. Well done Moget Africa!

If you don't understand all there is to know about Life and Money, you will learn a lot of it here. A great book for younger people about to strike out on their own, depicting good and bad consequences from money decisions we all must make at some time or another (real estate and investing decisions, recognizing scams, etc.). Some good lessons well taught through short examples. I saw myself in many of them....making moolah in some, and swallowing a bummer in others.

An absolutely great read. Great twists and turns and great characters. It was easy to visualize every scene. I certainly hope the author intends to publish more writing.

Frothy, intelligent, satirical, lyrical,diabolical, tragically and hillariously comedic gay lit/chic lit book brings to mind Armistead Maupin's tales of 1970's San Francisco.

Steven Stanley successfully evokes a very specific time and place (1970's Morocco) and interweaves multiple storylines. This book is recommended for all, especially those that are looking for an engrossing book to read on a lazy afternoon.

A previous review of Stanley debut novel, "Moroccan Roll", compared it to Maupin's "Tales of the City", if it were set in a small city in Morocco. I'd update that to being more of an incredibly diverse (in gender, sexual orientation and nationality) Moroccan version of "Sex and The City."

This ambitiously-detailed (417 pages) story centers primarily on a small group of American and French twenty-something singles teaching in Äin El Qamar, at a government school presided over by a dishonest, overbearing tyrant of an administrator. The teachers, a few of whom took the foreign assignment in order to forget past lovers, cope with less-than-luxurious living conditions, while trying to assimilate into a culture that seems very strange, judgmental and often unfriendly to them. There's Janna, a second year teacher who is still obsessed with a young Moroccan she had an affair with the first year, but seems to have moved on. Kevin is a gay man who is trying to forget the tragic loss of his lover, who shares a modest home with Dave, another gay teacher who left an incompatibly closeted lover and is developing a crush on one of his seemingly straight students. Marcie left the USA behind for the exotic charm of Morocco, and quickly falls love with a local who is known as a shallow playboy. Last but not least, we have Claudette, a slightly older French veteran who functions as a social director for her fellow teachers, when she is not entertaining local gentlemen callers who are likely just after her money. Other supporting characters include a man who has returned to teach in his hometown, a Frenchman who is the life of any party but always seems to go home alone, a French married couple with an apparent "open" relationship, a hunky tennis pro whom Claudette is infatuated with, and a young Moroccan student who stalks one of the American teachers.

It's a very well-written and entertaining book, which I initially thought was a bit overly long and detailed, but I now see that this is part of its charm, in that it engrosses you totally in the lives of these individuals. At its very core, it is a story about looking for happiness and love, and of learning to be open-minded enough in order to achieve those goals. I give it five stars out of five.

Stanley, Steven. "Moroccan Roll", iUniverse, 2007.

Morocco in the 70's

Amos Lassen

Every once in a while I come across a book that I know will not satisfy me with just one reading for whatever reason. Steven Stanley's "Morocco Roll" is one such book and because I enjoyed it so much, I want to add it to my list of books that I read over and over again. Stanley himself lives in Morocco for four years so he knows the backdrop well--so well, in fact, that I felt I was right there with him.
It is written in "Tales of the City style--there are many characters and they are not only involved in their own storylines but with each other. The cast is international in flavor--there are Americans, French and Moroccans and they are both gay and straight.
Morocco has always been a land of mystery to the West. It intrigues us with its eroticism and with its romance. It is the customs, traditions, and people that this novel is about and the people are weave tales.
There are five major characters and a plethora of minor ones. Their interaction and their lives give this novel its life. Claudette is a glamour girl who is full of adventure. A public love affair very nearly destroys her. Dave came to Morocco to get away from his boyfriend who could not accept himself as gay and chose to live in the closet. But he jumped from the frying pan into the fire when he fell in love with a Moroccan boy who happened to be straight. Kevin came to Morocco to have a second change at love as a tragedy took the man he loved from him. Janna succumbs to drugs so she could forget the Moroccan who broke her heart and Marcie who ran from Wisconsin so she could be free fell in love with a playboy. Each of these characters has to deal with his own demons and whether they succeed or not is left to the reader to find out.
Stanley manages to pull the reader because of his storyline and because of the way he writes. There is not a needless or redundant word in the book.
Steven Stanley is a man to watch and I do hope that he will not become a one book author. For a good and enjoyable real, it is also a way to meet new friends.

My favorite book on Moroccan history. Harris has access to exclusive parts of Moroccan society at a pivotal time in Moroccan history (leading up to the French occupation). He writes as a sensitive traveler, but one with an insider's point-of-view. His writing style makes historical figures human; comic and tragic. His book is both funny and informative. Highly recommended.

Walter Harris, London Times correspondant and 30 year inhabitant of Tangier, delivers the diffinitive account of pre-protectorate Morocco and the Moroccan Royal Courts. This eyewitness account of an ancient culture coming to grips with an overwhelming Western influence is both absorbing and hillarious to the point of disbelief. Harris' tales of Berber rebels and a matter-of-fact Sultanry, in addition to his coverage of the inevitabile process of European colonialization, captures the loss of innocence which befell a still vital land. A must read for anyone interested in North African history.

This book is fascinating. As someone of Moroccan heritage, I admired this book. There are however certain passages in the book that may be questionables but overall I highly recommend it.

Walter Harris may have been one of the most self-important men of his period, at least among the expatriate community in Morocco during his era. Even so, his record in this book is mostly accurate and always entertaining and informative. I might disagree a little with some of his insights, but his perspective is one worth studying and considering, as it was common in his era. If you have an interest in this era of Moroccan history, buy this book.

`Murder Unpunished: How the Aryan Brotherhood Murdered Waymond Small and Got Away with It' by Thornton W. Price III, has brought to life the events that I only remembered through newscast snippets and the occasional news paper editorial.

`Murder Unpunished' allows the reader to contemplate the concepts of the law being rational, yet the interpretation of the law may seem irrational. The reader can also reflect on why a person can act despicable yet still receive grace. Mr. Price presents the reader with an opportunity to question the concepts of revenge and universal justice. These themes of duality, like old friends, are revisited here in the pages penned by Mr. Price from his autobiographical and historic perspectives that have matured over time. He is unapologetic.

I for one wish to apologize for the state of Arizona's justice.

This book was very informitive about the code that convicts live under. Its a testament to learning to keeping your mouth shut when you do some dirt. Prison gangs are hardcore and the Aryan Brotherhood was formed in california with blood and sacrafice to protect white inmates, anybody who joins knows the commitment they are making as a soildier ( blood in blood out )

Inmates bent on running the asylum in an out-of-control prison dominated by homicidal gangs. Official corruption. Fraudulent land scales. A car bombing. Jurisdictional struggles. Hypnosis. A hung-over judge. Prosecutorial misconduct. A senile attorney.
What might sound like the ingredients of an over-wrought novel are the facts of Durango author Thornton W. Price III's nonfiction true crime book, "Murder Unpunished," published by The University of Arizona Press on July 1.
The cast of characters includes a future U.S. Supreme Court justice (Sandra Day O'Connor), a future Democratic presidential candidate (Bruce Babbitt) and the man who pioneered the psychological autopsy (Dr. Otto Bendheim).
But most of the players in this extraordinary peek at Arizona State Prison run amok came straight from Satan's casting call, even down to the unfortunate Waymond Small, possibly one of the nation's least likable murder victims.
The time is the late 1970s. In less than two years, there have been 14 murders and dozens of assaults at Arizona State Prison. The Arizona Republic has cast a relentless eye on the mayhem. The political pressure to do something ratchets up. And finally the Aryan Brotherhood takes a bridge too far with the murder of Small on the eve of his testimony to the state legislature.
Price, the author, was a young attorney. One of the inmates charged in connection with Small's death-a group collectively known as the Florence Eleven-ends up being Price's first murder case.
Tempting though it must have been, Price wisely avoids much use of the first-person in this economically written account of five murder trials. When he does resort to it, it's justified by the insight it offers.
My own first nonfiction true crime book, "Someone Has to Die Tonight," is scheduled to be published as a Pinnacle mass market paperback in March. I know the challenge Price took on in combing through 16,000 pages of court records and conducting interviews with key players for his narrative.
I also know how his involvement in the case probably made the task harder. I became a confidential informant in the case of a self-styled teen militia that I was documenting. Separating oneself from the story and keeping the narrative focused becomes more difficult when there's a personal connection.
The Florence Eleven was the case for Price: The case that every cop, attorney or crime reporter knows about-the one you never forget. In spite of this, Price showed remarkable discipline in his writing, and it serves his readers well.
My literary attorney, Bob Pimm, counseled me to make my book a train ride that readers wouldn't want to get off. The train needs to take off in the first chapter, he said, and the reader needs to want to say on all the way to the end.
Price kept me on the train.
"Murder Unpunished" has moments of writing that jumps out for its eloquence or economy. He describes one murder in two pithy sentences: "Even with a loaded gun to his head, the idiot wouldn't shut up. He'd dared him to shoot, so he did."
And here's how one of the large cast is introduced: "With a thin, six-foot-seven-inch frame, Jerry Joe `Stretch' Hillyer looked like he'd survived the rack."
And here, another: "Born in Scottsdale one week before the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Tidwell's life began in as much ruin as the Pacific Fleet."
Price knows we need humor in a dark tale ridden with murder, rape and drug abuse, and he finds it (somehow it always seems to be there, even in the darkest crime, often because of the extraordinary stupidity of some criminals, whose choices in life seem determined to provide job security for police and prosecutors).
"Did you see anything?" a tired investigator asks in one of 650 inmate interviews after Small's murder.
"No."
"Would you tell us if you had seen anything?"
And then there's Price's account of the state's attempts to hypnotize a witness, a chapter that may alone justify the book's $17.95 cover price.
True crime is a tempting genre for the very reason that makes readers sometimes skeptical the writer could really know all he portrays. How could we know people's thoughts? How could we recapture dialog years after the fact?
It's possible because of the uniquely thorough nature of investigative and court records, around which entire books can be built. It's not an easy task sifting thousands of pages for the specks of gold that add up to a compelling narrative. There are a lot of mediocre true crime books out there. Price's is not one of them.
Here we find a writer unafraid to show a criminal's sheer enjoyment of violence. A writer who's resisted the temptation to include every fact or exchange he personally finds compelling, restraint that must sometimes have been painful.
He knows court procedure and introduces us to terms such as the "slow-form guilty plea"-the trial of someone obviously guilty from the get-go.
He shows us the Mau Maus, the Mexican Mafia, the Native Brotherhood and the Aryan Brotherhood out of control in Arizona's penal system and what was done to fix it. He gets the prison language of kites, fish and punks exactly right in a sometimes profane book that avoids overdosing on cussing and violence.
He explains very well why prison crimes are so singularly hard to investigate.
Down among the human dross, Price somehow emerges with none of the nastiness sticking to him or the reader. Better, he somehow makes us care.
He gives fascinating insight into how the Aryan Brotherhood worked, like a business. And he offers some motivation without making excuses for his unattractive cast.
The case comes as close to Durango as Chimney Rock, just off Highway 160.
Despite a misprint in the spelling of Price's name on the cover (one of those palm to the forehead blunders that has probably cost some hapless copyeditor restful sleep) "Murder Unpunished" is otherwise flawlessly edited.
This is entertaining, educational and compelling. I hope Price will find another case somewhere in his career worth writing about.

Murder Unpunished: How the Aryan Brotherhood Murdered Waymond Small and Got Away With It is a telling example of the truth that entering prison is like entering another culture or country. The rules, customs, and behaviors are foreign to those in the free world. People outside of the walls will never be able to appreciate or accept. The problem, however, is that the prisons are within our country and need to abide by the laws of the United States of America. This book did an excellent job of asking the question, "does justice occur after incarceration?" The short answer is, no. The bigger question to ask is, "when will this country enact laws that can adequately deal with prison gangs and the control that they have in our criminal justice system?" This book is a telling example of all the state and federal correctional facilities will experience with any prison gangs that occupy them. It is a must read for all correctional employees and lawmakers.

I just wanted to say how wonderful and inspirational Dr. Capehart's book was to me and my children. The book opened our eyes to how fortunate we really are and my children could really relate to the book. I think Dr. Capehart has the biggest heart I know and will be great in whatever he does. Thanks for writing the book. I know it's touched many people, but know that it has touched my family.

I read the book 4 times and everytime, I was amazed at Dr. Capehart's experiences. His illustrations were great and only enhanced the stories he was telling. I also do missionary work and can relate to his experiences. I loved the book and have recommended it to everyone I know. I think Dr. Capehart has a good heart and will be a great doctor. I love his writing style and hope that he writes again.

I'm currently a student at University of Southern California (USC) Go Trojans! I just read Capehart's, "My African Safari." I have to say that it is an inspiring book. If you want a book that makes you visualize what it would be like to be in Africa, this is the bok. It really made me appreciate America and what I have here. I highly recommend this book to anyone. I hope this review helps you to read this terrific book.

Capehart's stories prove that truth really can be stranger than fiction. Some of his stories made me laugh until I cried...others evoked overwhelming emotions for the people he met and lived with. I was amazed by his experiences with members of the tribe, the local wildlife, and the conditions and patients he saw while volunteering at the hospital. For anyone who has ever become frustrated with the `rush' mentality of American living, or who has wanted to venture off the beaten path, Capehart's tales will open your eyes to another world. I highly recommend it!

As a woman of color, I expected to be offended by Nancy Duncan's book, The Nail That Sticks Up. I expected it to be another story of how an enthusiastic, dedicated teacher rescued some third world students from tribalism and ignorance through sheer force of personality and good intentions. To my surprise, the book exposes the reader to the lessons the teacher learned. Told without the least trace of condescension, this memoir-travelogue leaves the reader wiser and happier. It is full of remarkable people, singular destinations, and wonderful descriptions. Its tone is ironic and witty and there are many places where you can't help but laugh out loud or sigh with frustration. This book is so good, my only question is, when will it be optioned for a movie. It's got it going on--beautiful, fearless blonde on an adventure trek. Pamela Anderson is too old to play the part, but let's not rule out Blanchette.

The Nail That Sticks Up is a window into many cultures. Duncan's clear mastery of foreign languages and desire to live among the people whose lives she chronicles allow her to go where few have gone before. Duncan delves into the heart of Asian and African culture. The detail in every description leaves the reader feeling like they are IN the bustling market with her, not curled up at home with the book and a cup of coffee.
My teacher introduced this book to my class, asking us to read a few chapters relevant to our lesson. None of us could put the book down and most read the whole thing. The book is both insightful and inspiring. It leaves you with a desire to go out and see the world and also a deep sense of connection with all the people Duncan encounters. I recommend this book to people of all ages, but hang on to your seats, The Nail That Sticks Up is quite an adventure.

During my recent hospital stay, of the books I was brought to read, The Nail That Sticks Up, is the book I couldn't put down. The reader feels he is: meeting the people the author meets, scalding in a Japanese bath, sweltering in jam-packed, African buses, and freezing in a Chinese university dorm room in the dead of winter, along with the author, all without the discomfort that goes with actual travel. The book was so good, after I had given my copy to a friend leaving to study in China, I felt moved to buy one for her parents and one for another friend whose son has left to work in Japan. (One caveat-I don't necessarily agree with all of the author's perspectives e.g. on Christian Missionaries in China.)

The book is interesting and well written with a good deal of humor. It's a very insightful look at some of the important cultural difference to be in found in the areas Nancy Duncan has visited. I teach English to students from Japan and China and find the book valuable for the information it presents and for starting points of discussions I have with my students. I'd recommend it for a general audience and, in particular, to those who teach English language and culture to students from Asia.

I found this book as I was looking for a travelogue on Africa before I went there. What a delightful surprise it was. I loved it. I've gone on to read everything that Eddy Harris has written. His self-aware, honest reflections of what he is thinking as well as experiencing are a great read. And as a person academically trained in "cross-cultural sensitivity", I thoroughly enjoyed him saying very "unsensitive" things that any American has to really be thinking in some of his circumstances. I gave this book to my sister who has no interest in Africa and she liked it as much as me. It's just a fun (and educational!) read.

This book was greatly informative of what modern Africa is like. Many of us have misconceptions or just a vague knowledge of the so-called "Dark Continent". Harris opens it up for us. I found his courage and his adventurous spirit to be both touching and inspirational. My imaginings manifested themselves this year when I treked through Spain on the Camino de Santiago- where I met with and engaged the culture, the elements and my own will. The process of discovery and adventure outside commercial tourisim is the REAL way to travel. With travel we change the way we think of where we live ... this book encourages this philosophy and will hopefully provoke people to take some time and go off to discover something. I encourage all readers to discover this book. It will challenge you and the enrichment you recieve may surprise. Thank you, Harris.

The first three fourth of the book was amazing. The author painted a clear picture of the places he visited and the people who lived in the places he visited. I was, however, at times a bit annoyed by his failure to go beyond poverty and corruption to find the many positive images of the land and the people. I am an African who was born and raised in the continent ...and although living in the west has improved my "economical situation" I would not change the memories of my childhood for anything.

I also felt that Mr. Harris rushed through the last couple of chapters of the book. They lack the detailed imagery as well as the enthusiasm that was exhibited for the first three fourth of the book.

Still, I thought this was the best travel book I read on Africa.

This is quite possibly THE best non-fiction book I have ever read. It is a triumph of superb, lyrical writing and devestatingly honest philosophical reflection. It is a travel book, certainly - Eddy L. Harris, the author of (to my knowledge) four stunning "exploration" books like this one, travels through Africa top to bottom - but so much more.
Harris not only explores his terrain, he explores its people, its customs and the reaction he gets from Africans. At the same time, he explores his own inner being: what did he, as a Blackamerican, expect to get out of Africa? What did he really come to understand? And so on. As much as the book is about Africa the continent (and the reader is treated to descriptions of villages, recreation, transport, jungles, wildlife, etc.), it is about skin color, people, race, generosity, need, pride, and everything else that makes people human.
The description was beautiful and powerful: I would put the book down for the night, and when I started it again, would be transported instantly back to where Harris was and what he was experiencing, without any sense of a break.

This book deals with the generosity of a people who have nothing, thje patient endurance of a people who have been trampled on for centuries. This is not to say that the book was a typical liberal interpretation of the Third World; nor were Harris' experiences as a black man what one might expect. In fact, Harris' honesty was astounding. He described his neuroses about germs (and how he had to get over that in a hurry!), his anger at the condition of the African people, his sadness and pity at the tyranny of black officals. And in South Africa, he found not only a peace which he did not expect, he even felt so overwhelmed he retreated into a formerly white-only luxury hotel, an oasis amid the poverty of the black population. This, of course, was the source of further inner exploration about his guilt and his place as a black man, but an American - a true "Native Stranger."
All

Lovers of good political writing will enjoy this. I was greatly inspired by the first edition of this while I was a college student in the 1980s (when Mr. Mandela was still imprisoned).

Among the highlights are "Bantu Education" (1950s), a look at how the educational system for Black South Africans was designed to produce a class of cheap labor (as a Black South Carolinian, I can relate). Mandela's court speech prior to his imprisonment in 1964 reads like a South African "I Have A Dream" as he eloquently states the case of Black S/Africans and his willingness to be a martyr for that cause. (Check the actual sound recording of this on the CD "The Voice of Nelson Mandela" for the full effect).

Later, we see the level of principle of Mr. Mandela as he spurns offers for freedom under the conditions set by the S/A government in the 80s. We also read his post-release speech as well as his calls for peace among warring factions in S/A.

Makes you wish for eloquent, principled, and effective leaders like this in America. At least it can inspire future generations toward that direction. By all means, read it.

What a bottomless well of encouragement and inspiration one gets from its reading! Nelson Mandela, basing himself on the mass of Black, Colored and Indian, workers, peasants and other democrats of South Africa, was unbreakable at the hands of the horrific, murderous and terrorist system of aparthied. Akin to Nazis Germany, the Jim Crow USA South and Zionist Israel, South Africa enjoyed the backing of the US and British and Israeli governments until it was overthrown.

Joining the African National Congress in 1944 at age 26, he and other youth would lead its transformation from and organization of " gentlemen with clean hands" to the mass revolutionary democratic movement that would lead the revolution over apartheid. Doing so even while in prison for nearly 30 years. He was finally released in 1990 at age 72 and was soon after elected South Africa's president.

For decades, a popular demand in South Africa and around the world was: Free Nelson Mandela! This book does an excellent job of showing just why Mandela was so popular among the masses in his country and so feared and hated by apartheid's rulers. He was a first-class revolutionary who fought for decades for his country's freedom and always believed in the power of the masses of people to make change. This book is so inspiring because you read Mandela in his own words, starting as a student leader in the 1940s to a leader of the African National Congress's armed wing in the 1960s to an internationally known political prisoner in the 1980s. He never gave up and he outlasted the vicious apartheid system. The photos in the book also do a great job of showing what the struggle against apartheid was like.

What a wonderful experience-- reading and studying speeches and documents prepared by Nelson Mandela during five decades of struggle against the apartheid regime in South Africa! Here are key documents of the African National Congress, including the Freedom Charter that became the central document of the mass movement that brought down apartheid. Also Mandela's speeches at different stages of the struggle, including historic courtroom addresses when he was on trial for his life; documents Mandela prepared as the apartheid regime was forced to negotiate with him and the ANC in the late 1980s; and his first speeches after he was released from prison in 1990.
These speeches give a vivid reminder of the brutal, racist regime that was apartheid (and we should never forget that the South African regime was a pillar of U.S. domination in Africa from the 1940s on.) Mandela gives us a real feel for the determined, difficult, and courageous struggle of millions of people who never accepted submission to apartheid and the world-wide importance of the fight for a democratic, nonracial South Africa. And you see truly inspiring leadership in the persons of Mandela and his fellow leaders in the ANC.
Don't miss the 32-pages of photos that really help bring this rich struggle to life as well!

This scholarly and thoroughly impressive history of the Nile River provides a fine blend of geography and history as it surveys the river's importance to local lives and world events. From its various ecological niches and environments to the special history of its evolution and importance to mankind, The Nile is filled from cover to cover with a wealth of lively and articulate description.

There are a lot of great books on the Nile; Emil Ludwig's classic and Alan Whitehead's come to mind. This is another, updated version, that fills in a lot of the blanks left by the earlier books. It is well written and up-to-date. The emphasis is on politics and history but the author also appreciates the physical wonder that is the Nile. The author spends a lot of time talking about this place and that place, but the book is full of excellent maps to guide the geographically perplexed. It is a good read for the adventurous as well as those interested in the challenges facing modern Africa.

By Robert I. Rotberg

The life-giving Nile of lower Egypt trickles first from two springs in Burundi and Rwanda and then meanders 4,238 miles as the White Nile through great equatorial lakes; loses itself in tangled and difficult swamps; tortuously emerges to run freely toward its confluence with the much more powerful, if shorter, Blue Nile from Ethiopia; and then flows over cataracts and dams through the great desert to the Mediterranean Sea.

Over five millenniums, the nutrient- and silt-laden Nile floodwaters enabled agriculture and civilization to flourish all along its lower reaches. When the annual summer flood failed, however, the northern Sudan and all of classical and modern Egypt suffered hideously.

Collins links the dark ages of dynastic Egypt and the successes of invading outsiders to those sometimes prolonged periods when the Nile withheld its renewing gift. In turn, those dry spells reflected shifts in the rainfall patterns of equatorial Africa and highland Ethiopia, not - as the Egyptians always feared - to the manipulative scheming of Ethiopian monarchs or African chieftains.

There were many efforts to measure the flows of the Nile, and then to harness it effectively. Taming the Nile, the quixotic goal of administrators from early times, led to the first small dams, and in the early 20th century to dams in the Sudan. President Gamal Abdel Nasser's Aswan High Dam of 1970, with its 300-mile lake and its ancillary dam at Roseires in the Sudan, were together intended to regulate the river forever, smoothing out the years of high and low water. But the mighty Nile refused to capitulate, and the impoundment of its waters has led to great silting and weakening of the dams, the impoverishment of Egyptian agriculture, unexpected disease, and unanticipated economic and social consternation.

Collins's seamless biography captures the soul of a river that is both a result of and a continuing influence upon Africa's geology, climate, history, peoples, economy, and politics. Collins roams over the 2 million-square-mile basin of the Nile - the smaller rivers, the large and tiny lakes, and the glacier-capped mountain ranges - and writes movingly of the glory and challenges faced by the immense cascade of water as it makes its way over myriad waterfalls and past pumping stations, villages, towns, and cities to its ultimate destination. He also captures the trials and triumphs of the Nile's sometimes human- assisted passage through the Sudd - a vast eddying swamp-like mass of lagoons and channels that long defied explorers and entrepreneurs as they attempted to follow the White Nile south into equatorial regions.

Counterintuitively, more of the merged waters of the Nile come from the Blue branch, not the much longer and more tortuous White system. The Blue starts higher than the White, at 9,000 feet, and then rushes into shallow Lake Tana. From shores ringed by Coptic Christian monasteries, the Blue carves a great arc through the lava dikes and sandstone plateaus of western Ethiopia, strengthened by three significant and many minor tributaries until it leaves the highlands and crosses into the Sudan as a source of regular refreshment.

As in any great biography, there are diversions off the main channel. Collins swoops readers into the Baro Salient, that riverine mapmaking mistake that thrusts Ethiopia into the southern Sudan, where commerce coursed clandestinely across borders. He takes us on a fascinating search for 15-foot canaries - not in John Williams' standard "Field Guide to the Birds of East Africa" - high up in the Mountains of the Moon (the Ruwenzori Range). And he supplies unexpected facts. For instance, as mighty as the Nile may be, its volume of fresh water delivered to the Mediterranean is only 2 percent of the total of the Amazon River and 15 percent of that of the Mississippi River. For much of its 160 million-year history, the Nile emptied into the Indian Ocean; only in comparatively recent geological times has it flowed north.

This is an easy book to read and to like. Yet there are occasional anachronisms, where sketches of people or places forsake the findings of modern linguistic and ethnological scholarship, and repetition of pet phrases or factoids. But the book's big flaw is the fault of the publisher: The quality and clarity of the maps and photographs are inadequate for a study as important as this panoramic biography of a pulsing river.

� Robert I. Rotberg directs Harvard's Program on Intrastate Conflict and is president of the World Peace Foundation.

from the January 09, 2003 edition - ...

There are a lot of great books on the Nile; Emil Ludwig's classic and Alan Moorehead's come to mind. This is another, updated version, that fills in a lot of the blanks left by the earlier books. It is well written and up-to-date. The emphasis is on politics and history but the author also appreciates the physical wonder that is the Nile. The author spends a lot of time talking about this place and that place, but the book is full of excellent maps to guide the geographically perplexed. It is a good read for the adventurous as well as those interested in the challenges facing modern Africa.

This book is scintillating and titillating. Kevin really brings the audience into his world...a world of confusion, humor, and a large bee-face. Well worth the read.

I am a personal Friend of Kevin Gordon. I have taken tennis lessons with him for five years. I was interested to know that his book had been published. I immediately began reading it the day it came out. I was at the book signing at a nearby Borders the first day also. I went home and began skimming it like I always do. It was great once I began reading. He used such intricate detail to get his point across. I was astonished to read about things that wouldn't even be thought about in the United States. He explained even the smallest things that really got to me. I have begun to apply some of the things that he talked about in his book to my everyday life. I would have never known about sharing a taxi cab if I had never read this book. Can You even picture sharing a taxi cab, or taking cold bucket showers, or even a steady flow of unselfishness? I have learned through this book that there is a truth out there somewhere and we must seek it in order to become better people.It has been wonderful reading this book and I encourage others to see eye to eye with me by reading this book also.

From the BEFORE:this book looks interesting. AFTER: that book had a profound effect on me file, I strongly recommend this book. Kevin Gordon(KG) documents a five-month wild ride through western central and southern Africa. This trip was a physical, spiritual, and psychological marathon that elucidated exteme emtional highs and lows for KG. He is a unique individual in a unique circunstance. He is a black man raised in Canada by Jamacian parents, and educated in prep schools and eventually Harvard; he seems to have no niche. Part of this trip was a search for identity. KG struggles with weighty issues such as slavery, neocolonialism, racism, and poverty in this wonderfully human prose, yet somehow never becomes preachy. In fact, the journal is peppered with a great sense of humor, often in the least expected places. Between pondering which one of his relatives was unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time while visiting Cape Coast (slave ship place) he searches for Dallas Cowboy updates, details his gastric indulgences(and frequent extreme hunger) and forms many amazing relationships. The boldest aspect of this books is KG's honesty with himself, and therefor his readers. He painfully acknowldeges his hypocrisies. Everybody has inconsistencies in their ideal beliefs versus their behaviors. Very few of us can admit them to ourselves yet alone publish them. The struggle with his desire for western comforts versus his desire to be a true African and take life in stride continues through the entire journal. The descriptions of the beauties of Africa, both the land itself and the harmony of the various cultures is as memorable as the extreme poverty and suffering he sees in Zaire. This book will open your eyes to the real Africa. KG's passion is to teach. He does a fine job of that through his journal.

Kevin Gordon's first book "Not Yet African" chronicles the author's four-month journey across the heart of Africa, from Senegal to Kenya, in 1993-1994. From the book's cover we learn that Kevin is from Winnipeg and well educated, that his skin is brown, and that he is unsure of his place in the world. We learn that he feels neither African nor American nor Black nor White nor Ivy League, and we wonder as he does 'Who is this man?' Kevin explored Africa as a shy and soft spoken young person looking into the roots of himself and of the continent that he hoped to call home, and 'Not Yet African' is a close transcription of the journal he kept there. His descriptions of Africa are excellent (seven days of waiting for a train that never comes and wondering if he'll get his passport back from the police!), and as a travel story 'Not Yet African' is a good read. But what makes this book special is the clarity and power with which Kevin describes the lifeblood of Africa and his own yearning to be part of it. Kevin lays his soul bare for us in this book, and his courageous writing alone is worth the time it takes to read it. Kevin may be neither African nor American, but in Nigeria and Cameroon and Zaire and Kenya he finds something, a place for his heart, a home for his soul, or at least one of the rivers which has given him life. 'Not Yet African' is a very personal tale about the grief of losing roots and the hope of finding them again, and I learned alot from it. I hope that others will read it and find in Kevin's words a thread common with their own, for this is how healing happens. We're all from someplace, even if we don't have a name for it yet.