New Zealand Books

In a world where people indefinitely hesitate to take that first huge leap from the world of corporate B.S. to 'really live life to it's fullest', I applaud Burke in taking that step and sharing his amazing experience. The author invites you into his vivid world and shares his fears, joys, new found friends and the simple pleasures in doing what he loves, "Surfing."

What a great read to help encourage one to take the first leap!

Awesome read! I loved the way Anderson makes you feel like you're right there with him with vivid descriptions and colorful wording. Enough levity to make you laugh out loud, enough somberness to make you think about where your own life is going and realize that the rat race is not the way to happiness, and enough adventure to make you want to experience his travels for yourself! I hope there's another book from him in the not-too-distant future!

Anderson Burke delivers an adventure most of us only fantasize about - leaving an unsatisfying corporate job to fulfill a wanderlust desire.
From Fiji to Austraila to Vietnam to Africa, West of Indigo Blues takes
you on a wild ride through fascinating countries and cultures. This book
will have you packing your bags for Mr.Burke's next adventure.

If you have a) any appreciation for travel (e.g., desire to experience new people, cultures, foods, etc.), OR b) been squelched by working for 'the man', GET THIS BOOK. This book is filled with unique characters, lessons in history & geography, appropriate & intermittent social commentary and a WHOLE LOT OF LAUGHS.

His journey from Corporate Boardroom to Fiji surf breaks to Mumbai's "untouchables" should be required reading. Bring on some more Mr. Burke.

I truly enjoyed this book. Its immense readability allows you to follow the author effortlessly through many countries. There are many interesting characters in this book, some of which seem as restless as the author. Through his travels, Burke shows you a world in flux. The constant movement is a plus for the reader. The book never stagnates as he moves from country to country. This book may serve the reader as a basis for the reader's own search for a more meaningful existence.

beautifully illustrated, heartwarming childrens stories. Even though the Angelina stories are geared towards girls, my little boy, at 8, enjoyed these as well, especially when mom read to him. These are good stories to read to your child at bedtime.

The artwork is detailed and delightful to look at-you'll see new things each time you look, and children love that that every scene is filled with many little mice.

This Angelina story deals with a sometimes hard topic to talk about-jealousy. Each book is filled with wonderful life lessons told in a gentle, non preachy way.

I highly recommend this series for any child.
5 stars!

Some of the other reviews mentioned toddler girls liking this book, well I guess some middle-aged "girls" like this book too! I'm almost 50 and don't have kids, but even I enjoyed this book.

I thought there were 2 good lessons presented:

1. Having a boy (Henry) want to dance and be in the ballet.
2. Showing Angelina being jealous, but putting that aside to help Henry when he needed it.

Learning not to stereotype and to forgive are lessons we all need to be reminded of from time to time.

We're slowly working our way through the Angelina Ballerina books, based on the fanatic love of several of my daughter's friends for Angelina. Angelina loves to dance, and gets the opportunity to be in a real ballet as a magic fairy. One slight problem is that Angelina's cousin Harry, who looks very silly dancing, is also in the ballet as an elf. When Harry gets a line, Angelina must deal with her feelings of jealousy.

This is a relatively short book, with some great artwork, that parents won't mind reading multiple times. Like some of the other Angelina books, a part of the story is about Angelina dealing with her feelings, and happily, it all works out in the end.

In this next book in the Angelina Ballerina series, Angelina finds herself pursued by her cousin Henry, who wants to dance just like her. She is overjoyed when an adult ballet asks her and Henry to dance in one of their performances. However, her joy turns bitter, when the other dancers become enamored of Henry, and Angelina finds herself in the background. However, when Angelina decides to soldier on, she finds that things can go her way anyway.

As with the other books, my daughter and I loved this story, and Helen Craig's charming illustrations. A quick read, this book also has a wonderful lesson. We both highly recommend this book.

This was a great book! I especially liked it because I am very much interested in ballet. This book was about a mouse named Angelina and her being invited to perform in a "grown up" ballet. She got a good part just like she wanted, but became upset when her couin Henry got a part and got more attention then her. She felt better though when the star of the ballet gave ger a flower. I think that this book is very good for both children and adults because you can learn a good lesson from it that you can be jelous, but it often doesn't pay to be.

Buy this book. You will enter this story and truly be absorbed. Patricia Grace is one of the most important writers in contemporary literature and this novel is one of the most necessary texts that I've come across in a long time.

I was travelling overseas when a friend gave this to me to read on trains and downtime - I couldnt put it down and read and re-read it continuously. Im a HUGE fan of Patricia Grace and find myself wanting to crawl inside her books and become a part of the characters world. What away she has with worlds - thank you Patricia!

Baby No-Eyes is a novel beautiful in both language and content. Patricia Grace weaves this complex yet very comprehensible novel through the use of four narrators, each of whom serves as a different lens for understanding the events which take place. Although I do not wish to over-simplify the book by saying it is a story of the Maori struggle in a Pakeha-run environment, this is certainly one of the most important themes.

The main piece of plot, as far as action goes, involves the legal battle over an area of sacred land between a group of Maoris and the Council--a government group attempting to uphold and profit from outdated land "negotiations" between the Maori people and the British. Grace deals with this topic firmly, yet does so in a manner which does her surname justice. She manages to point out the absolute absurdity and unfairness within the bureaucracy without falling into large-scale hatred of all things Pakeha.

Aside from the David verse Goliath type theme, the idea of family is an incredibly important issue in the novel. Grace challenges some normal conventions of the immediate family, and opens up new avenues of thought for understanding what family can mean.

In Baby No-Eyes Grace has created an intricately woven, powerful piece. It offers an insightful and informative viewing point into certain aspects of Maori culture, and is also simply a well-crafted and engaging piece of fiction.

This is one of those books that you want to re-read after finishing it. I love it.

This novel is a very enjoyable read but as an added bonus it also enables your eyes to be opened more about the maori culture through the lovable characters. It takes you into what they as a people hold dear and why, and as a sub-plot there is an attempt to get a piece of swampland returned to a particular tribe and this involves an occupation of a park not too dissimilar to the Wanganui occupation of recent New Zealand history. Especially if you are a New Zealander of european descent this book is valuable because it makes you see the issues from a different perspective then your own and I found that aspect nearly as interesting as the actual story. Overall I found the charm of this story is the ability to take a horrible act of insensitivity and turn it into one of the most original characters ever told.

Darkest Hour very well captures the actions and consequences of life and death decisions by Australians in the World War II Pacific theater. A page-turner, I lost track of time while reading the book following the Australians and their Japanese pursuers through the jungles and waters around New Britain. Mr. Gamble's writing is able to relate historic events, the battleground geography, the environment, military plans and decisions (or lack thereof) with the personal struggles of the men and women caught up in a one-sided fight. It was a great reading experience that is most highly recommended.

Darkest Hour is not only an excellent historical account of one of the most important "battles" at the beginning of World War II but also an entertaining read that is hard to put down. The author does a good job at character development, which is often something lacking in these kinds of books. He follows the Lark Force from its inception in Australia to its demise (mostly) in the wretched hold of a Japanese cargo ship. All is not hopeless as the stories of those who did manage to escape the island and get back home are told in adequate detail. This book made we want to read more about this period of World War II in the Pacific theater.

Pearl Harbor, Normandy, Stalingrad, Iwo Jima. These are just a handful of the battles that come to mind when people think about World War II--and rightfully so. Thankfully, though, Bruce Gamble extends his vision to one of the most gripping, and tragic, stories of the entire war. The story of Lark Force. Not only a true page turner (Gamble is an excellent story teller), Darkest Hour is obviously well-researched and filled with detail. Put simply, their story deserved to be told, and Bruce Gamble provided a fitting tribute to their legacy.

Darkest Hour is a moving book about one of Australia's least known World War Two incidents.
My grandfather died on the Montevideo Maru and for years I've searched for information about his death and his time on Rabaul. This book provided me with many answers others haven't.
Bruce Gamble writes about the members of Lark Force as real men and honestly discusses the controversy surrounding their fate.

A compelling, disturbing book that brings this darkest hour in Australian war time history into the light.

The book "Darkest Hour: The True Story of Lark Force at Rabaul" is a compelling historic accounting of those Australian men and women on the southwest Pacific island of New Britain that was run over by the invading Japanese Army. Their fateful encounter began at the early morning hour of 2:30 a.m. on January 23, 1942. The Japanese rushed ashore to completely overwhelm the 1500 men and six nurses in the garrison; thus begins one of the most tragic tales of WWII.

Less than 25% of those in the garrison were able to escape and evade and after many weeks of hardship found their way off the island to safety. However, those that remained were captured and endure cruel and sometime lethal treatment at the hands of the Japanese. In one incident alone, two hundred POWS were executed. But a worse fate was still awaiting 850 of the survivors when they were torpedoed by an American submarine and went down with the ship while locked in their holding cells below deck.

The book is obviously researched very well. Author Bruce Gamble writes this historic story as if he were an eyewitness to the events. It is a most compelling and entertaining tale that shows the courage, sacrifices and horrors of war first hand. Gamble makes us feel the emotions of that group as he shares with the reader some of the small details of the events by the people involved. The writing is top notched and goes beyond a mere reporting of what happened. It captures the heart and soul of that time and place. Reading this true story will change you; you cannot help but be moved by what happened to these men and women.

This book is one of those that once you begin reading it you do not want to pout it down until you are finished with it. I give this book my personal endorsement and highest recommendation. It has also earned The Military Writer's Society of America's top book rating of FIVE STARS! This book is more than just history--it is also a tribute to those fine soldiers and nurses of Lark Force who gave their lives for freedom.

I honestly could not tell you how many times I have read this book (or the entire series, in fact). While I liked all of the books in the series, Death's Master is the one that has stayed most clearly in my memory. The stories of Zhirem, Kassafeh and Simmu have stayed with me for many years.

For those of you not familiar with Tanith Lee, she writes lush prose and in this series focuses on creating a cycle of stories which interconnect. Although it would be easy to go over the top, she somehow manages to always stay on the good side of going too far. Although any of the books in the Flat Earth series can be read as stand alone novels, I believe that you will be more quickly immersed in her world if you begin with Night's Master (the first in the series).

I first read it as a pre-teen (snuck home from a garage sale). However, it is not for nothing that these books are called "adult fantasy". Caution recommended for younger readers.

Tanith Lee addresses some disturbing questions in this book. One is, what would you do with immortality if you have it? The other, what would you do if you were invulnerable?

The androgynous Simmu, (he actually could change body forms too), the son of a lesbian queen and, for lack of a better word-- a corpse, was adapted by demons after he was left to die in his mother's tomb. He later meets Zhirem, a boy made invulnerable at the cost of his mother's beauty. The novel addresses their tortured love story in the context of the Demon Lord's mischievious plans to entertain himself, and the Death Master's fight to preserve his supremacy over humans.

Character development was excellent in the case of Simmu and Zhirem. You could read into why they ended up doing what they did, but you could never guess what they were about to do before it happens. Simmu gains immortality and becomes the King of Simmurad (City of the Immortal). Zhirem, the invulnerable, becomes th! e greatest sorcerer in the world, but was directionless until he was taken up by the Death's Master to take on and destroy Simmurad.

The other characters in the story are no less fascinating. Simmu's mother, Narasen was inflicted with a curse by a spurned sorcerer (would-be lover), but her cleverness saved her. Unfortunately, she was felled by treachery in her moment of weakness. Having struck a deal with the Death's Master, she was bound to serve him as the undead. Lylas, the witch, was the Death's Master's handmaiden. Her schemes drive the story forward. Kassafeh, Simmu's wife and the daughter of a sky elemental, was the key to Simmu's immortality. However she finds herself trapped in her immortality. Ironically, she breaks out by betraying Simmu, thus becoming the key to the destruction of Simmurad.

The other questions addressed include, why do people chose to do good, to the point of becoming saints? Is it because they are afraid of being evil? What is evil? ! And so on...

The story is of course, a LOT more complicat! ed than that. After all, it is about how unusual people dealt with unusual circumstances. I totally loved it. It's a great example of Tanith Lee's work, it's brilliant and if I had more space, I will keep on babbling on about how wonderful this book is.

If you've never read Tanith Lee's stuff, this could be a great intoduction for you.

This was the second book I ever read by Tanith Lee, the first was the Silver Metal Lover. I stumbled across it in used book store, read it in a couple of hours and then ran out to find the rest of the series. I love Lee's fantasy novels and this series is probably her best.

The story takes place over an extended period of time and tells the tales of several different characters and how they relate to dying, death and immortality. The common thread is the Lord of Death and how humanity perceives him. There is also the side story of how he interacts with the Lord of Night and the demons. The entire series has a mythic quality, like these were the tales of some long lost culture.

The books in this series are: Night's Master, Death's Master, Delusion's Master, Delirium's Mistress, & Night's Sorceries.

You could read the first 3 books out of sequence and not have any spoilers. Don't read Delirium's Mistress until you have finished the first 3. The last book is a collection of short stories and can be read at any time, but it is assumed that you are familiar with the mythos of the flat earth.

Death's Master ultimately clutched me by the heart and reeled me into spirals of emotions, reviving deep regions within which I almost doubted I had. The characters are so magnificently described that you actually able to feel at one with them, experiencing their joys and weeping when tragic irony had its will (the misfortunes of beloved Zhirek and Simmu...).

This is definately one of Tanith Lee's most brilliant ventures yet.

I have read this volume several times. Each time I read it, it moves me beyond what mortal life can do. Through the first half of the book, I feel light and carefree as if it strips my sorrows. After the end, I drip into the bleakest, blackest melancholy, despair unlike any other. After a period, My despondence lifts and I feel free. I am cleansed of all human pressures and woes. I highly value the tome for it's pure unadulterated emotions.

I bought my son several of the Let's Read and Find Out books for Christmas. He's a first grader going on 7 years. These are just absolutely fantastic books for introducing varoius difficult concepts. I like that they contain alot of information, but are still easy to understand. Hard to find something "not too young, not too old" for this age. We love them. This particular one was a favorite.

One of my older children brought this book home from a school book sale many years ago. It was a hit with both of my children for several years. Then, as they grew up, the book was put away in a box for another time.

When I had another child, I got out that "box for another time" and stacked the books on a shelf. This one was amongst them, and onto a shelf it went, though I did't expect it to be of interest to him for several years yet.

But lately, at 21 months, Jack has been asking for this book frequently -- and listening with interest to reading after reading! I doubt that the concept of "how much you weigh on Mars" makes much sense to him yet -- but the idea of gravity is one that he is working out, and Branley's explanations of the Earth pulling everything to its center is simple and seems to satisfy even at this age!

Even better, the science is simple, but accurate so it's a good start on his physics education!

Although this book will painlessly teach your four year old what science is and what that abstract concept, gravity, is, it is also excellent for a teenager who is struggling through a physics course. As Einstein said, you don't really understand a concept until you can explain it to your grandmother. Well, this is a book for Grandmother.

This book is as important as it is wonderful. It brings home the Big Secret about science that escapes most people: Science is about the unknown, not the known. There are lots of mysteries out there; the business of science is to change the unknown into the known, which is the lesson, I think, of Franklyn Branley's masterpiece.

In 1990, my husband went to the library and brought home " gravity is a mystery" for our son to read. He loved it! It was his favorite book for weeks! Every night one of us would have to read it to him. This is a fun book that everyone should get a chance to read.

For those who are about to visit New Zealand & love waterfalls, this is the book for them. It gives good descriptions of the Waterfalls & their locations with details of how to reach them. A must have book for Waterfall-holics.

I am part-way through the production of a Hi Def Video on "Waterfalls, Brooks, Creek & Streams" that has taken me all over the US and Canada and another shoot comes up which required me to travel to Australia last month. What an opportunity! Just hop over to New Zealand and shoot some more waterfalls for my video! But how do I find them? I Googled "New Zealand Waterfalls" and up pops Johnny Cheng's beautiful book. It arrived in time for me to take on my flight. I would only have a few days to shoot in New Zealand, so needed to choose the waterfalls carefully. With all the great photos and detailed maps and directions in the book, I found it easy to make my choices. I selected my base near Fiordland on the South Island and during the limited time I was there, got terrific footage of some beautiful waterfalls. The directions, maps and distance measurments in the book were spot-on, so I didn't waste any time "searching". The shots I got of these New Zealand waterfalls are stunning in High Definition. My thanks to Johnny Cheng and his book "New Zealand Waterfalls" for helping to make my DVD even more beautiful!

I found the book "A Guide To New Zealand Waterfalls" to be one of the best waterfall books I have seen. The book is packed with color photos and maps. The layout of the book is very user friendly and well thought out. The writing is very clear and concise.

This is a must have for all waterfall lovers and anyone living in or visiting New Zealand.

Scott A. Ensminger, founder of the Western New York Waterfall Survey.

This is a very well produced, very well rounded guidebook. I was a bit disappointed at the lack of coverage of the South Island (considering how many waterfalls there are on the South Island), but given that the author lives in California, and conducted this research over a few trips to the other side of the planet, this is a commendable book. I own many books on the subject of Waterfalls and this is simply one of the best ever printed.

Nature enthusiast Johnny Cheng presents A Guide to New Zealand Waterfalls, an absolutely stunning trail guide written especially for nature hikers desiring to see the pristine beauty of New Zealand's glorious waterfalls firsthand. Packed with gorgeous full-color photographs, maps, extensive text directions, an at-a-glance rating system for the different hikes categorizing them according to scenic value, hiking difficulty, and driving difficulty. A Guide to New Zealand Waterfalls is very tightly focused on its subject matter and does not have any information about hotels, restaurants, and the like; little more than a brief glossary, a one-page summary of English in New Zealand, and an index round out its coverage of waterfall hikes. A truly stunning guide, unmatched in its coverage of waterfalls and filled with breathtaking photographs for the armchair traveler.

For those of you entering 'political science' as an academic major, you must read and re-read S. E. Finer's magnum opus, his three-volume set THE HISTORY OF GOVERNMENT FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES.

You will learn how foolish our system of government is for the Twenty-First Century. It is the purpose of government to make human life tolerable and survivable. The usual nitwits in military, religion and business conspire to destroy the principle of enjoyability of life.

Since Dr. Finer has a lucid mind, he will teach you things that your own physical laziness or mental sloth would preclude you from learning. He will empower your mind. Will you use his knowledge to hurt your fellow man or to help your fellow man? A work of this genius is read more by fools and scoundrels (who wish self-enrichment at the expense of the common good or group), rather than humane, sensible minds concerned about the well-being of their society.

If you are a Political Science student and/or teacher, and you do not own a copy of this three-volume treatise---by cold logic you are a pauper, a miser or a dunce!

Respectfully,


John E.D.P. Malin, M.A. (Literae humaniores)
Chairman of the Board & Chief Executive Officer
Informatica Corporation
Executive Division
P.O. Drawer 460
Cecilia, Louisiana 70521-0460

Contact: InformaticaMalin@gmail.com

Ever so often you find a book that not only deepens your insight on the topics you expect it to cover, but also gives you a wholly different perspective in a much wider field. This is such a book. This book covers the whole field of development of government. The first part gives a referencemodel for descibing government, its most important uses and the powers limiting it. This part would be a satisfying book in itself. The most fascinating parts come later. The rest of the book discusses all the governmental systems that where in some way innovative.All you ever wanted to know about goverment and but never knew that it could be so interesting. But it als gives insight in the mechanisms of power. The description of the signifcance of access to an chinese emperor and the importance that gives to humble titles as royal cupbearer etc. lets you see patterns you can see in everyday life and more important lets you enjoy them. I found the book to be full of these gems, and at the same time it maintains a clearity of focus that is amazing. The only drawback is it's size and the time it takes to think about what you have read.

This book is one of those rare works that is so very good, that you cannot really describe it: language is not rich enough to do it justice. I can do little more than quote from the review of the prestigious The Economist:

"If there were a Nobel prize for political science, Sammy Finer would deserve to win one for this extraordinary trilogy--a work of scholarship so broad in its sympathies, so ambitious in scope and so elegantly crafted that it leaves the reader gasping, literally, with astonishment and delight...[L]ikely to be read as long as Aristotle. No finer work of political science...has been published in this century."--The Economist

Finer's triumphant work of comparative government history is a rare gem. It is not often that a historical study is both deeply informative and perspective changing. This book is both. Finer does not simply outline the devolopment of government, but constructs an entirely new intellectual system for viewing, interpreting, and discussing government. From there he moves on to trace the evolution of government from Sumer to the Industrial Revolution. Every major development is explored, and many minor ones are also included.

Finer shows a mastery of every time and place in history. It is amazing that he can conver accurately and informatively Han civilization and then switch to an excellent discussion of Roman civilization. The same skill with which he reconstructs the governments of Sumer and Egypt is applied later to the constitutional monarchies and revolutionary governments in modern Europe.

Finer's masterpiece ought to be read by anyone interested in an objective study in how societies orgzanize themselves. It is a highly useful reference that should be owned by anyone who works with history on a regular basis.

This three-volume set constitutes the most stimulating and thought-provoking item I've read so far this century, and it is likely to remain so. I stumbled on it by chance in the Bookshop at the British Museum in early 2001. I read it in the United States later that spring and since then a day doesn't go by but what I remember some insight that I gleaned from it. It is history in the grand style, but with a message that is simple and powerful: people are pack animals. They will be governed -- sometimes in a haphazard or mediocre manner, often appallingly, once in a while really well. Not least among its many virtues, the set shows better than a thousand stumps speeches just what is so distinctive about the tradition of liberal democracy, and how it came into being (for more detail, pop over to the separate Amazon page for Volume 2 of this set and read the instructive comments of "Amazon Customer").

A motivational message to prospective readers who are dismayed by the prospect of a three-volume set. You don't need to read all of it to get value for your money. You don't even need to read it in sequence (I did not). Perhaps the most accessible parts are in Volume III, especially Books IV ("The Re-creation of the State in Europe) and Book V ("Pathways to the Modern State"). From there you might want to go back to Volume II, specifically Part III of Book III, more precisely still Chapter 7 on "The Republican Alternatie: Florence and Venice," followed by Chapter 8 and its magisterial discussion of "Representative Assemblies." From there a natural course is back to Volume I and its discussion of Athens and Jerusalem (Finer is particularly good on the distinctive contribution to governance from the tradition of the prophets). This is a Western-centered view, and should not be read to distrct attention from Finer's extraordinary treatment of the Chinese, the Indians and the societies of the Middle East. But these are in some sense self-contained units and can be addressed on their own terms.

This backwards progression would leave for last the stuff that Finer put first: the "Conceptual Prologue," which is perhaps better understood as a summary and analysis. But whatever route you take, surely there is no end of riches in this extraordinary capstone to a great scholarly life, well lived.

Would you like to know how life would be with dinosaurs? Well, if you do, read If Dinosaurs Came to Town, by Dom Mansell. In the book, it talks about 20 dinosaurs and how it would be to live with dinosaurs. This book has awesome drawings! If Dinosaurs Came to Town is a great book!
Student from G.P.

I love reading this book to my children, and have given it as gifts several times. The story is informative and intriguing and puts the awesome power and diversity of dinosaurs in a way even my 4 year old can relate to. The front pages that give parents a "cheat sheet" on how to pronounce the names of the dinosaurs are very helpful.

The book is a scary and tremendous way for kids to learn about dinsoaurs. It tells you about what it would be like if dinosaurs came to your town. What would you do? Try catching them? What you would do is run to your car! Kids who like dinsoaurs would love this book.

My daughter and her girl friend love this book -- it's not a gender specific topic. I also think this book IS full of information -- just the right amount for a young child. It's really well done.

Young boys love to have this book read to them. Visually it is interesting because there is so much to see and find on each page. The story fires the imagination - "what would happen if dinosaurs came to your town?". The writing is fun and exciting for children, and as a parent who has reread this book countless time to my sons, I don't mind rereading it either.

I had no idea of the things Arnett had done before the 1st Iraq war. He has led quite an amazing journalistic life. Very enjoyable read.

I have read several reporters auto-biographies but Peter's is the most interesting and gripping. It is full of insightful detail that really makes you feel the excitement and terror of being a war correspondent.

For anyone with the least bit of interest in the Vietnam "police action" and the Gulf War, and honest wartime reporting from someone with an impenetrable sense of integrity, this autobiography is a "must read." Dr. Arnett's autobiography should also be required reading for all jounalism students as a measure of their worth and what it takes to persevere when the "real story," the story on the ground, may not necessarily match that of the "party line."

Want to know what really happened on the battlefield in Vietnam and else where? Read this book. As with most good journalists who stood firm maintaining the freedom of the press, and gave the public a true picture of what was happening abroad, he was railed on by the Pentagon and Whitehouse officials throughout his career. I've just read the book and something especially haunting was the last chapter. He is covering Afghanistan, the year was about 1993 after the 'freedom fighters' got rid of the communists and the entire country is ridden with corruption, violence, and warring factions. While waiting for his plane to Kabul he has a conversation with an influential Pakistani who blamed the chaos on the "mercurial American foreign policy". Saying "all you Americans cared about was destroying communism, and you welcomed extremists to the struggle and trained them to kill. But many of those people don't like you either, and you're the next target". On the very last page, Arnett ends the book as he is leaving Afghanistan, he writes: "The collapse of the Soviet empire, the end of the Cold War, had not brought harmony to Afghanistan, merely conflict and criminality. And the United States would reap a bitter harvest from the seeds of the Islamic revolution it helped sow. I was glad to be leaving Afghanistan but I knew that the story was not over". I would probably have to go back". As usual,the Pentagon and their right-wing pundits who attack people like Arnett as sympathizers, and conspiracy theorists, have been proven wrong by history, and the current events today.

A thrilling account by a master journalist who pursued `the story' for four decades over four continents. Guided by a determination to write only what he himself saw, Arnett sent out a steady stream of reports about what was actually happening in Vietnam, shrugging off the official military handouts as the "Five O'Clock Follies." His doggedness, bravery and resourcefulness in getting to where the action was resulted in Pulitzer Prize winning reports. He later became famous, if controversial, as one of the few American reporters to cover the Gulf War from inside Baghdad. An exhilarating read.