Travelogue Books

Terence White, for more than 15 years one of the kings of the Afghanistan press corps, writes a thriller that has the additional advantage of being true.

He starts by being gut-shot with shrapnel while covering a Kabul mortar attack gone wrong, survives Afghan hospitals and returns a few years later to see what's become of the country. All in all, White gives you a perceptive insider's look at the country from the fall of the Soviet-backed regime until the recent days of the US-led incursion.

Throughout this genuinely exciting page-turner, his wry, self-deprecating, Kiwi humour, and his often ironic take on the deteriorating conditions in Afghanistan, make it the best book on Afghanistan that I've seen in the past decade or more. Gripping stuff and well written. If he starts writing fiction, order that too.

The 9/11 attacks prompted not just US military intervention in Afghanistan, but -- even more swiftly -- the descent of a Western-style media circus upon that benighted and war-torn land. In its turn, the 2001 media invasion yielded a spate of books by newly minted experts. Some were newcomers to Afghanistan: They pasted over the gaps in their experience with secondhand 'analysis' rooted in a conventional wisdom that was always mostly nonsense. Others were pseudo-'old hands' whose claims to expertise, or even marginally useful experience, were undermined by a variety of factors. Foremost among these were a refusal to spend serious time in-country, instead 'parachuting' in on brief trips to score a swashbuckling dateline; consequent ignorance of local languages and customs, and confusion over basic politico-military issues; and most of all, a profound lack of intellectual rigor.

'A Taste for Hot Steel' is not of that genre, and its author utterly not of that ilk. That alone makes Terence White's memoir a must-read for anyone hoping to grasp how things really were in Afghanistan when the Taliban and al-Qaeda rose to power. Among other differences, 'Hot Steel' saw print at a decent interval: far too late to capitalize on the post-9/11 window of publishing opportunity. White, it appears, has too much respect for Afghans to exploit them as a stepping-stone to fame. Moreover, this is a memoir first and foremost. Beyond providing a brief historical summary, 'Hot Steel' does not really set out to explain Afghanistan -- a refreshing break in itself. Lesser reporters and 'analysts' have lectured us (and Afghans) ad nauseam about the place, and have mostly gotten it wrong. White, on the other hand, clarifies much without really trying.

'Hot Steel' engagingly documents White's New Zealand childhood and his adventures in Southeast Asia, Indonesia and elsewhere, both before and after his time in Afghanistan. But his account centers on the years that he spent reporting from Kabul for Agence France Presse, from 1992 through 1997. No Westerner spent more time there, under more dangerous conditions.

Today Kabul is occupied and patrolled by Western troops. It is home to a community of perhaps 6,000 extremely sheltered foreigners, whose creature comforts include poolside parties and French restaurants. So it must be explained that reporting from Kabul in the 1990s involved daily legwork along the front lines that would have tested the nerve and eardrums of a trained soldier. The city was split violently down the middle: government loyalists on one side, a renegade alliance backed by unfriendly neighboring countries -- notably Pakistan -- on the other. Many frontline neighborhoods were left in ruins. Most neighborhoods were wracked by artillery, rocket and small-arms fire. Today's Western hacks -- glued all day to their computer screen while their Afghan stringers gather what passes for news -- could hardly have imagined, much less endured the conditions in which White immersed himself. Yet he did so day after day, year after year, through five years of warfare and political upheaval. In the end, he left only because paranoid Taliban officials kicked him out.

In those days, when Kabul was quiet, action often erupted in the countryside. One of White's more hair-raising war stories opens on an autumn day in 1993. The beleaguered Afghan Defense Ministry offered to fly journalists to a strategic rural district by helicopter, to prove they had just beaten back an attack by a particularly nasty renegade faction. White jumped at the chance. A gaggle of other journalists -- many of them based in the West, in Afghanistan only for a few days -- boarded rather more reluctantly. When the choppers touched down in Tagab district, sure enough, the enemy had abandoned the district headquarters. Hearing the rumble of artillery fire many miles to the south, White climbed aboard a government ammo truck headed down to the front -- just to find out what was really afoot. All the other hacks save one boarded the choppers to fly back to town. White and his colleague -- unsure when and how they would return to Kabul; with no interpreter, no entourage, no minder, and no 'security' except government troops defending tenuous forward positions -- arrived at the front line in the teeth of a renegade counterattack. Few reporters have survived adventures as terrifying as what ensued ...

Much of the narrative revolves around an even more harrowing incident that nearly cost White his life, and left him hors d'combat for several months: A Defense Ministry mortar tube malfunctioned, blowing itself and its crew to bits almost in his face, while he was photographing them in October 1995. Experienced Afghan surgeons at Kabul's military hospital saved White's life. (By 1995 they had been operating on wounded Afghans for nearly two decades.) They also understood that, while they could stabilize White, they could not protect him against the infections that would likely ensue. He was medevacked to France promptly after the Afghans pulled him back from the brink. It speaks volumes of both the man and his subject matter that it never occurred to him to steer clear of embattled Kabul after he recovered. Yet White avoids the self-conscious swashbuckling of certain Western 'adventurists' who have milked Afghanistan for fame and fortune.

'Hot Steel' also avoids two common but unfortunate Western attitudes toward Afghans. These stem from a profound lack of cultural sensitivity among the Western pseudo-intelligentsia -- reporters, diplomats and aid workers, especially human-rights activists -- whose collective views inform most of what the outside world thinks it knows about Afghanistan. Such Westerners gravitate toward Afghan 'technocrats,' mostly either urbanites once affiliated with the brutal 1980s communist regime, or wealthy scions of the pre-communist feudal establishment who spent decades in exile in the West. These Afghans wear suits, speak English or other Western languages, enjoy their whiskey, and have assimilated (or at least know how to parrot) politically correct Western shibboleths. Therefore they must be the country's natural leaders, right?

The first tendency is to portray Afghan 'technocrat' values as mainstream, and everybody else's as 'extremist.' The second -- arising when reporters come to grips with the 95 percent of Afghans thus rendered 'extremists' -- is a tone that makes it clear the reporter regards his subjects as one-dimensional, barely human: like animals in a zoo, or role-playing actors at a theme park. Pirates of the Hindu Kush, anyone?

White's account is free of such dehumanizing overtones. He knows who the real Afghans are; he likes them (or not) on the same basis as he would a fellow Kiwi. He doesn't always approve of their customs or behavior. But he regards them as his fellow men and women, not curiosities in funny headgear.

Though his memoir leans more toward action than contemplation, White should consider trying his hand at a serious political analysis of Afghan affairs -- which he understands far better than, say, US or UN officials. If anybody were actually willing to listen to him (hardly a foregone conclusion, of course), his wisdom and experience might actually help the West avoid another 1842 in Afghanistan ... a country that could yet make the Iraq war look like a squabble in a kindergarten sandbox.

I've been doing a lot of research on ancient Rome for a book I'm writing and accidentally stumbled on this text (the 1985 edition) in a used bookstore. It's a fascinating read and an invaluable resource.

What I love about it is that it not only provides a very concise history of Rome, but explains how the Romans dressed, ate, worked, played, entertained themselves and lived day to day. It also covers the literature and religions of the time.

If you loved HBO's "Rome" series, Colleen McCullough's "Masters of Rome" books or are interested in the era for other reasons, this is a superb, well-written account of the people and the time. I couldn't recommend it more highly.

The Romans how can you not love them! This book gives you the reason why. It covers all aspects of the Roman livelihood, their homes, jobs, lands and customs. I think it is one of the better general informative books about the Romans out there, and would give a real good education for the general reader. For the skilled professional or student of the classics, this book will help touch up what you don't know and secure what you do. It is worth the read, and you will be able to tell why it is a standard classic used to teach in so many universities.

Among his Baby Boomer contemporaries, Al Kesselheim has distinguished himself as a gifted observer of the natural world, and an expert in reading the nuances of water, (both physically and metaphorically).While his previous books involve single nautical adventures, here he takes us on several. Not all of them, of course, involve life-changing encounters but each has meaning, meaning especially insightful for those of us whotoo often are bound to our offices and daydream of stealing away more time outdoors. Kesselheim'swriting is like the lakes and rivers he navigates--full of strong undercurrents that liehidden just beneath the surface of his narratives; pools and eddies colored with humility and reflection; big, sweeping landscapes that form an intriguing emotional backdrop. Threading the Currents is a fine read.

Among his Baby Boomer contemporaries, Al Kesselheim has distinguished himself as a gifted observer of the natural world, and an expert in reading the nuances of water, (both physically and metaphorically).While his previous books involve single nautical adventures, here he takes us on several. Not all of them, of course, involve life-changing encounters but each has meaning, meaning especially insightful for those of us whotoo often are bound to our offices and daydream of stealing away more time outdoors. Kesselheim'swriting is like the lakes and rivers he navigates--full of strong undercurrents that liehidden just beneath the surface of his narratives; pools and eddies colored with humility and reflection; big, sweeping landscapes that form an intriguing emotional backdrop. Threading the Currents is a fine read.

Woa what can I say , A book I can Actually read.....

If you're a fan of British comedy, you probably remember the television series "The Goodies" starring Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie, in which the trio had their wacky adventures and travelled around on a three-seater 'trandem' bicycle. The actual trandem was bought at a BBC props auction and ridden for charity through Africa...a hilarious travelogue of the collision between British eccentricity and adventure and African tradition and exploration. If you enjoy humorous travel books like those of Bill Bryson, Michael Palin, or 'Round Ireland with a Fridge' by Tony Hawks, this is the book to look for...IF it was in print! It's currently out of print in the US and even Amazon UK (www.amazon.co.uk) doesn't list it as available. Come on, US travel publishers...this should be a constantly in-print classic: get on yer bike and get it available again!

This is the first review I've written on a book... actually on anything. But, I HAD to write something on this one. It definitely deserved it. This is my new beer bible! This book has a place of honor behind my bar. It is a definite "must read" for anyone even remotely interested in beer, it's history, and the many places around the world where it's served. I couldn't put this book down. You won't be disappointed, I promise! Cheers!

If you've ever sat in a pub with a pint and wondered how people approach their beer drinking in other countries (or how it is brewed, marketed, served, and what food is served with it), you'll enjoy this book! The author combines a healthy dose of British humor with a genuine love of beer to recount his world travels. Warning: I was subject to occasional intense cravings of the beers that Mr. Brown drank around the world while reading.

Great Book! Highly recommended. I read it in once sitting. Great pics as well. Would I do it... no way!!! I agree with the author... he definitely has determination (and guts)!!!

Very interesting description of his adventures through the heart of Africa. It encourages me to strike out for the wilds.

I was recommended this book by a friend. I must say I was a bit apprehensive as I am not normally into Travelogs, but I must say I really enjoyed it. My only criticism, is that it could have done with some photos of the places that were visited, but other than that... a great read. Australia is certainly more wacky than I realised.

I very much enjoyed this novel and found it to be a real page-turner in that it was a tale of endeavour and continually emergent experiences. This novel touched on an area most Australian's seem to be little aware of and seem themselves to experience almost as a foreign country most notably the centre and north of this massive country/continent. Indeed an area that most of us won't experience whilst traversing the urban parts so well advertised by the brochures. As such I found it a fascinating contrast from that given by the rather conservative and urbanised travelogues I'd read on this country by Bill Bryson's `Down Under' although in itself an interesting travelogue. Bill Bryson's travelogue was the last book I bought for my brother when he left for Australia three years ago, this will be my next one.

I laughed and laughed, David Bennun really brings Africa back. He just knows people and the world you live in when you are there. I love Zambia and Kenya, and he just made it alive again. Thanks for the great read, and I won't sell mine!

No oxymoron that. Not in David Bennun's hands. A Brit whose family left England for Colonial Africa in his boyhood, Bennun's nature evidently never expatriated the stiff upper lip, the sharp eye for the contagiously absurd, or---and this may be Fever's greatest selling point, for it makes all the rest so possible---the palate for language as only the bellwether British wield it. Far from a pythonesque humor; you know: with simple silliness the Wont that you often wish Wouldn't? Bennun is drop-dead funny. And I don't laugh-out-loud easily. More than once, my chest having long since rounded the corner into some soundless seismic convulsing, I dropped the book on my faintly blue-feeling face from asphyxiating in bed. (The story of his Jack Russell terrier alone is worth humor's All Time list.) And I ask you: How often do any of us ever delve along a literary skill that wastes not a single sentence? You can count those masters of concise thoroughness on half the one hand you use to hold up a favorite book (or in my case, not). Bennun is as aerodynamic an author, in his own milieu, as the greatest I've ever seen: and if that makes him the Nabakov of Satire? then Vladimir--not David--it is. Damn near every utterance morphs into a garrulous gem, no sentence dispensable, most quip-laden and quotable, all culminating in chapters memorable to a one about the real Africa in David's openly unreal vantage, his own foibles always foremost, from a self-deprecating wit-in-progress. Myself?.....Never one to let the complete absense of company dampen a conversation, I'd often read things in the book over again immediately--aloud--just to share them with somebody---Anybody---me usually the handiest, splitting my own sides with disemboweling dependability. But, like the boy in the book, I too have a hard time learning my lessons. Why even now, from time to time, foolishly undeterred by my bedtime injuries I read on, headless, only to wind up again the very picture of casualty: a free arm broken over my eyes, elbow high, while alone beneath it my open mouth, wide as the search for affordable dentists, palsies off in porcine snorts, gaped like a gash so they tell me, the very wound of the proverbial Death From Laughing. So: don't say you haven't been warned........

Needless to say, David Bennun's book ends way too soon, which is to say, it ended at all, and, Endorphin-addiction being what it is, sent me hunting the world wide web for the guy when all else failed. Now I DID locate a superb skill-set-exemplary article he penned about ITN's anchor-siren Daljit Dhaliwal meeting her prime american fan David Letterman, on air, that may still be available on-line, but other than that for now, alas---rein plus. Nevertheless, Bennun here is a fever worth catching, but only if you can stand the symptoms. Happy breathing.......

A wonderful account of a young college student's experience in third world Zimbabwe. Though focusing mostly on a feminist aspect of the country, Perrin's travels are well rounded and insightful. She takes you out of your comfortable lifestyle by showing us what and how we take our lives for granted. Very motivating in you are interested in world relief.

"Tonderai" is the Shona name that was given to Perrin. Appropriately, it means "Remember." Tonderai conveys a vivid sense of Zimbabwe - the land and its indigenous people; readers feel they are literally looking over Perrin's shoulder. Embedded in the book is a concept of education as an active process of doing, of experiencing life with all the senses, and learning through interaction with others.

Tour of Duty in the Pacific Northwest: E.A. Porcher and H.M.S. Sparrowhawk 1865-1868. My great grandfather was a warrant officer gunner on this ship during the exact period covered. E.A. Porcher was the Captain of H.M.S. Sparrowhawk and a brilliant water colour artist. I ordered vis Amazon.com as I was able to purchase a brand new copy of the book for less than half the price of a used copy in the UK! Okay, it took 27 days to arrive in UK but I was told this when ordering. Very efficient service - very well packaged and arrived in perfect condition. I certainly advise UK based customers to check this site if time is not important. Thanks. The book gives a fascinating insight into the life of British sailors 140 years ago and of the relationship between the Canadian Innuits and the authorities during the establishment of British Columbia. The watercolour paintings are a delight and study of the characters and their costumes brings the period to light.

Edmund Augustus Porcher was the captain of a Royal Navy vessel serving an Esquimalt-based tour of duty on Vancouver Island. Porcher was also a watercolor artist who made an impressive array of sensitive and skillfully executed paintings of what he saw. A Tour Of Duty In The Pacific Northwest: E. A. Porcher and H.M.S. Sparrowhawk, 1865-1868 is an impressive and uniquely informative work drawn from the ship's record and Captain Porcher's commentaries, enhanced with his superb paintings and illustrations presenting the reader with a kind of "window in time" to understand and feel what it was like in those times and places along Canada's Pacific coasts, as well as the complex and multifaceted roles and functions of a British war vessel. A Tour Of Duty In The Pacific Northwest is a unique and highly recommended contribution that will be greatly appreciated by students of maritime, and Canadian nineteenth century history.