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Title: The Places In Between
ISBN: 0156031566
Author:
Rory Stewart
Publicate Date: 2006-05-08
Publish: 2006-05-08
List Price: $14.00
Average Customer Rating: 4.0
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $3.98
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $2.70
Amazon Merchant Price: $11.20
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Meh
What Mr. Stewart did was brave, and interesting in theory, but the narrative that emerges is unavoidably monotonous, as the areas he walked through are pretty much the armpit of the world. Blah blah snow blah grudgingly given sleep space in the mosque blah left the next day blah Kalashnikovs blah they threw rocks at my dog again. I was hoping for a much more eventful story as I love travel writing and have been wanting to know more about that part of the world... and it turns out, not surprisingly, that it's primitive and poor and cold and isolated and just not real interesting. And this is not to denigrate Mr. Stewart: on the contrary he should be admired for telling it like it is.
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2: Lone travel adventurer
At times I was so bored with this book, but then a gem would strike and egg me on. It was also good background material on the Islamic mentality before coming to Saudi Arabia. And who doesn't love those who put themselves at risk to recount their stories so the rest of us can live adventurously through them, all from our comfy living room couch without even having to obtain a visa?
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3: A Singularly Important Book
This goes on the IMHO List for Top 5 most important non-fiction books. It is a fascinating book if you want to vicariously go to a place you would never go to (rural Afghanistan) and do something you would never (in your right mind) want to do, walk across it. But it joins "A Bright Shining Lie," "Cycles of American History," "The Devil Came on Horseback, and "Parting the Waters" as books every American should read.
"A Bright Shining Lie" tells the story of the generation-defining war in Vietnam through the life of someone who believed in it. "Cycles of American History" explains our historical, psychological (schizophrenic!) tension between the private and the public. "Parting the Waters" chronicles the Civil Rights movement, not as some mythologized magic moment, but as a movement of fallible individuals responding to a system of disenfranchisement and terror. "The Devil Came on Horseback" explains Darfur, and how easy can that be?
"The Places in Between" explains a culture that is very, very alien to us. But it does it by introducing us to people, who have had to adapt to a harsh land and a harsher history, but they are still people, just like us. If I were to caveat my glowing review of this book, I might say that it is best if read along with another non-fiction story of great compassion and understanding, "Three Cups of Tea," also about Afghanistan.
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4: Babur's Journey
The Places In Between is an interesting and well written account that provides in-depth views about Afghanistan's ways of life. This is a book westerners should read if they want to further understand the intricacies of this region and the contradictions between cultural diversity and globalization.
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5: A Cold but Not Too Lonely Walk
It's amazing that anyone would even attempt this... walking across Afganistan in the winter with a war going on. It is quite staggering, how many different ways he could die... war casualty, fights with officials, accidents, frostbite/exposure, starvation, food poisoning...
The desolate landscape is hard to envision, although the photos helped. How does one step forward in 4 feet of snow? Temperatures are cited well below zero at night, so besides unease provoked by well armed people he's sleeping with, how does he sleep with undoubtedly cold wet feet?
The descriptions do not bring the walk, the towns or the people alive. Abdul Haq was the only character drawn in a memorable way. Stewart comes to know others, be they guards, hosts or aid workers that surely had a story, but there is dirth of text about them. Some things mentioned in passing crave more desciption, such as the soldiers with eyeliner or how his food is prepared. Not only are women nearly absent from the text, their absence is not discussed by Stewart.
The book disappoints not by what is in the text, but how much more should be there. A few of the drawings and quotes from historic texts helped elaborate, but most appeared to be filler.
Perhaps it's not fair to to Rory Stewart that I had just finished reading Paul Theroux's Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Capetown, about an equally dangerous journey before reading his book. Theroux is a master in travelogue writer. While The Places In Between, is highly readable, is not up to the Theroux standards for this kind of writing.
For me, this is a 3 star book, but I'm giving it 4 stars because of what the author accomplished, more than what he wrote about it.
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