| ASIA & THE PACIFIC |
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 AN UNEXPECTED LIGHT: TRAVELS IN AFGHANISTAN,
Jason Elliot
Part travelogue, part historical evocation,
part personal quest, and part reflection on the joys
and perils of passage, this book is the most sustained
firsthand description of life in Afghanistan by a foreign
observer in recent years. This is an account of Elliot's two visits
to Afghanistan. The first occurred when he joined the
mujaheddin circa 1979 and was smuggled into Soviet-occupied
Afghanistan; the second happened nearly ten years later,
when he returned to the still war-torn land. The skirmishes
that Elliot painstakingly describes here took place between
the Taliban and the government of Gen. Ahmad Shah Massoud
in Kabul. Today Elliot's sympathies clearly lie with
Massoud, who was recently assassinated . Elliot travelled
widely in the hinterland, visiting Faizabad in the north
and Herat in the west. The result is some of the finest
travel writing in recent years. The book is filled with
background information, history, and a genuine understanding
and respect for the people of this embattled land. |
$18.00 (softcover)
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TALIBAN: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism
in Central Asia, Ahmed Rashid
Shrouding themselves and their aims in deepest secrecy,
the leaders of the Taliban movement control Afghanistan
with an inflexible, crushing fundamentalism. The most
extreme and radical of all Islamic organizations, the
Taliban inspires fascination, controversy, and especially
fear in both the Muslim world and the West. Correspondent
Rashid brings the shadowy world of the Taliban into
sharp focus in this enormously interesting and revealing
book. It is the only authoritative account of the Taliban
and modern day Afghanistan available to English language
readers.
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| Based on his experiences as a journalist
covering the civil war in Afghanistan for twenty years,
travelling and living with the Taliban, and interviewing
most of the Taliban leaders since their emergence to
power in 1994, Rashid offers unparalleled firsthand information.
He explains how the growth of Taliban power has already
created severe instability in Russia, Iran, Pakistan,
and five Central Asian republics. He describes the Taliban'
s role as a major player in a new "Great Game"--a competition
among Western countries and companies to build oil and
gas pipelines from Central Asia to Western and Asian
markets. The author also discusses the controversial
changes in American attitudes toward the Taliban -- from
early support to recent bombings of Osama Bin Laden'
s hideaway and other Taliban-protected terrorist bases
-- and how they have influenced the stability of the
region. |
$14.95 (softcover)
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AFGHANISTAN: The Land that Was, Roland
and Sabrina Michaud
Once upon a time, before the Soviet invasion and two
decades of civil war, Afghanistan stood as a beautiful,
if austere, country. Enchanted by the dramatic landscape,
two photographers from the West devoted 14 years, from
1964 to 1978, to documenting its rugged charms. From
ruined cities covered with desert sands to the Pamir
mountains, where caravans of camels walk across frozen
rivers in winter, to the Turkestan bazaars along the
old Silk Road, the Michauds travelled and came to love
this ravaged paradise and its proud peoples: Pashtuns,
Tadjiks, Hazara farmers, Uzbek horsemen, Kirgiz shepherds,
Nuristani mountain dwellers, and Derbiche vagrants.
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| With the photography of the Michauds and
the text by prizewinning poet and essayist André Velter,
this striking testimony to the Afghanistan that once
was will help readers understand and respect a country
now so central to current events. |
$46.10 (hardcover)
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THE
BOOKSELLER OF KABUL, Asne Seierstad
In Afghanistan, just after the fall of the Taliban,
a bookseller named Sultan Khan (aliases are used almost
throughout) allowed a Norwegian journalist to move into
his home and experience firsthand his family's life
in the newly liberated capital city of Kabul.
From that act of openness emerges this remarkable
book -- the most intimate look yet at ordinary life
for those who have weathered Afghanistan's extraordinary
upheavals. One husband, two wives, five children, and
many other relatives sharing four small rooms opened
up their lives, unforgettably.
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$19.95 (hardcover)
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THE
KITE RUNNER (fiction), Khaled Hosseini
The unforgettable, heartbreaking story of the unlikely
friendship between a wealthy boy and the son of his
father's servant, The Kite Runner is
a beautifully crafted novel set in a country that is
in the process of being destroyed. It is about the power
of reading, the price of betrayal, and the possibility
of redemption, and it is also about the power of fathers
over sons-their love, their sacrifices, their lies.
The first Afghan novel to be written in English, this
is a sweeping story of family, love, and friendship
set against a backdrop of history that has not been
told in fiction before, bringing to mind the large canvases
of the Russian writers of the nineteenth century. But
just as it is old-fashioned in its narration, it is
contemporary in its subject-the devastating history
of Afghanistan over the last thirty years. As emotionally
gripping as it is tender, this is an unusual and powerful
debut.
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$14.00 (softcover)
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